The BARTÓK GOTHIC project brings its sixth edition to Club Mixtape 5 in Sofia on October 1, 2026. Béla Bartók's string quartets get played in a club room, starting at 8pm.

The idea behind the project has been running for three years now, and it is neither academic nor pompous. Bartók's string quartets are works with a particular, darkened beauty, and that is exactly why, from the seventies onward, they keep turning up as music in horror, drama and gothic films. The project presents them through that lens - through goth culture, where millions of people around the world recognise the same aesthetic.

The performers are the Art&Shock String Quartet: Stoimen Peev and Ivaylo Danailov on violins, Stefaniya Yankova on viola and Viktor Traykov on cello. All four are young musicians, and putting Bartók into alternative art spaces rather than a concert hall is itself part of the concept.

This sixth performance is the first time the project plays String Quartet No. 2 and String Quartet No. 3. Added to those is a set of selected duets for violin and viola performed by the youngest followers - violinists Anton Georgiev, Kaloyan Dimitrov, Yoan Anastasov and Kamen Velichkov. Tickets are 15 euros through bilet.bg.