Kiril Marichkov was born on October 30, 1944. He began
playing the piano from an early age, but later in life studied
Engineering. In 1967, he co-founded the group Shturtsite (The Crickets)
with Petar Tsankov, who was by then his fellow musician in the group
Bandaratsite. The name of the new rock band was chosen following a radio
competition. Initially, the musicians played songs by established pop
composers, but gradually developed their own sound based on
stylistically diverse compositions of their own – rock 'n' roll, melodic
ballads, hard rock and progressive rock. Kiril Marichkov is a frontman,
bassist and principal composer, and Shturtsite has 12 studio albums and
a number of mini-vinyls (това ли се има предвид?). In 1967, the band
collaborated with Georgi Minchev and received their first critical
acclaim for the song “White Silence” by composer Boris Karadimchev
(feat. the string quartet Dimov). The song won First Prize at the Golden
Orpheus Festival, and was subsequently singled out as a Melody of the
Year at the TV competition of the same name. The following year, the
band's first mini-vinyl was released, featuring the songs “Vesselina”,
“Ring”, “Little Bright Window” and “Seeing Off”.
Over the
following years, Shturtsite's popularity was constantly growing to reach
its peak in the 1980s when they released the albums “Twentieth
Century”, “The Taste of Time”, “The Rider”, and “Musketeer's March”.
Their contemporary and stylistically diverse songs win over young
audiences, with the lyrics being written by some of the most renowned
Bulgarian poets. The rock band has over 3000 fully packed concerts in
its career.
In 1997, Shturtsite reunited to celebrate their 30th
anniversary with a tour, which once again packed the halls and summer
theaters. In the same year, their eleventh album, “30 Years The
Crickets”, was released.
At the beginning of July 2007,
Shturtsite embarked on a national tour on the occasion of its 4oth
anniversary, with all concerts being free of charge. They also released
their 12th album “On the Brink of the Heart”.
Kiril Marichkov himself
has recorded two solo albums – “Star Sign Cricket” and “I Want to Say”.
“It has always been important to me what my songs are about. I believe I
have no lyrics to be ashamed of. As for my favourite lines, I rarely
use the very word favourite,” says Marichkov.
He also has
composed the music to eight Bulgarian films, including to the cult
classic “Yesterday” by director Ivan Andonov (the song “Vow” – one of
the most popular in the Bulgarian cinema), “Rio Adio”, “Indian Games”,
“Vampires and Goblins”, “The Danube Bridge” (the song “My World”), “The
Most Important Things” (the song “I Love You Forever”), etc.
“I
very much wanted to make film music. Back then, Ivan Andonov, with whom
I was close, was making his movies and I was eager to write the music
for any of his films. I didn’t dare, though, to even hint about this.
Then, one day, he told me, “I'm going to do a movie about the 60s, the
Beatles’ times. It will be called “Yesterday”. I'd like you to write the
music for it.” I was overwhelmed with enjoyment. That’s how it all
started,” Kiril Marichkov recalls about his first film song “Vow” – one of the golden Bulgarian hits.
In
1992, Kiril Marichkov together with Konstantin Markov (bass player in
the rock band Tangra) launched the rock radio station Tangra. Their
unforgettable concerts at the Summer Theatre in 1993 and 1994, organized
by the radio, marked the beginning of the Rock Film Fest, organized by
the radio.
In the 1990s, together with other prominent figures
of Bulgarian culture, the rock star participated in the democratic
opposition movement. He was elected a Member of Parliament to the 7th
Grand National Assembly. It was then when he composed the song “I'm only
human”.
Since 2013, Marichkov has been a member of the
superband “The Foundation”. In 2017, Shturtsite celebrated its 50th
anniversary with a concert at Arena Armeets in Sofia. Guest musicians
were Ivan Lechev and Slavcho Nikolov, and B.T.R., D2, Tangra and The
Foundation performed as warm-up bands. It was yet another unforgettable
show – a spellbinding mixture of Shturtsite's dynamic and emotionally
charged music and timeless lyrics. “Two Traces”, “Meeting”, “Past-Tense
Rock”, “The Taste of Time”, “Twentieth Century”, “The Rider”, “Vow”,
“Magic Colour”, “Musketeers' March” – these are but a few of the band's
golden hits, which have been cherished by several generations of music
lovers so far.
