DJ Balthazar

Balthazar was born in 1977 in Bulgaria, and has been interested in music for the past 15 years. He started DJ'ing in 1998 and now he's known as one of the most respected and popular bulgarian DJs/producers. He has performed at every major club in his country as well as on many big raves (including the Bulgarian Street Parade) and various radio and TV shows. His international gigs have taken him to more than 20 countries including USA, Egypt, England, Germany, Austria, Netherlands, Portugal, Belgium, France, Malta and Cyprus, to name a few, and he is one of Bulgaria's top music exports. Very often he plays at special events alongside well known and respected DJ's or Live acts, such as Sven Vath, Chris Liebing, Marco Carola, John Acquaviva, Speedy J, Umek, Valentino Kanzyani, Cristian Varela, Adam Beyer, Carl Cox, Paul Oakenfold, Ben Sims, Jeff Mills, Josh Wink, Wally Lopez, D-Formation and many others.
Balthazar's unique style varies between groovy minimal techno, tech-house and a bit of progressive/electro house, always corresponding with the newest records on the scene. Usually his sets are quite energetic and technically perfect. Between 1999 and 2001 he was a resident DJ at the 3000 people capacity Indigo club in Sofia. Currently he holds various residencies at different clubs in the country. Balthazar is also co-owner of Renesanz - an agency for electronic dance music, promoting numerous parties and booking foreign house and techno DJ's for selected clubs and events. In short time since their inception, the Renesanz dance parties have grown immensely popular and have become a national trademark for Bulgarian dance culture. During the last few years, Renesanz have organized parties and events with over 150 international artists and DJs.
Since 2004 Balthazar has been producing music with his studio partner JackRock. Their official debut project was a 45-minutes set for a fashion show in Germany. They also composed the soundtrack for the DVD movie Clinique Noir #2.
In January 2006 Balthazar & JackRock released their debut record Rockin' Dancefloor on the greek label TechHead, with remixes by Eric Sneo and Cave. The EP reached number 1 in Musicmail Distribution's sales charts and was played by DJs like Marko Nastic, Pedro Delgardo, Marco Lenzi, Ortin Cam & Dylan Drazen. A few weeks later Balthazar & JackRock released the top selling record Moonshine on the belgian label Magura, which was co-produced with the renowned artist Kobbe and was heavily supported by star DJs like Carl Cox, Sander Van Doorn, Marcel Woods, Preach and many others. Moonshine was included in the official Dance Valley 2006 CD compilation and was presented in Judge Jules' BBC 1 radio show. Kobbe & Balthazar also released two remixes on the dutch label Patterns and norwegian Spilo. Later in 2006 followed a second Balthazar & JackRock EP on TechHead Recordings, Venus Delta EP on 8311 Music, 2 tracks for Chris Binder's imprint Primal Confusion + a few other CD compilations. In 2007, 2008 and 2009 Balthazar & JackRock released more than 30 original tracks and various remixes on different labels all over the world, including the single Tribalero on Muzik Xpress Uruguay, which reached top 20 in Beatport's house chart. Tribalero was also included in a few Tecktonik CD compilations, released by EMI and Universal Music.
In 2007 Balthazar started another joint project with the bulgarian band Deep Zone, which was meant to be more pop-house orientated. They produced together 2 smash hits: Welcome To The Loop + DJ, Take Me Away, which both topped many music charts in Bulgaria and its neighbour countries (Greece, Romania, Serbia, Turkey). Only for 1 year they managed to do 4 big national club tours with 20 dates each and more than 80.000 visitors total. In 2008 Balthazar & Deep Zone took part in the biggest musical contest in the world – Eurovision. They won the bulgarian final and represented their country at Eurovision 2008 in front of 150 million tv viewers worldwide! Balthazar & Deep Zone won awards for 'Best South-East European Track' (SEEME) and 'Best Joint Project' (Fan TV). Their videoclip of DJ, Take Me Away was also nominated for a few other music awards (Mad TV, BG Radio, MM TV).
In August 2009 Renesanz organized the dance (main) stage of the biggest bulgarian festival – Spirit of Burgas.
In 2009 Balthazar & Renesanz became owners of one of the oldest electronic music clubs in Bulgaria (established in 1997) – the legendary Comics club in Varna.
In November 2009 Balthazar & JackRock were invited in Egypt for the DJ Academy in Cairo. There they taught DJ workshop courses on mixing and production.
In June 2010 Balthazar & JackRock started the label Renesanz Recordings, with main purpose to represent their vision of techno sound. In 2010 and 2011 they also released over 30 tracks and remixes on Bosphorus Underground, Neurotraxx, Binary 404, Human Garden, Land of Voodoo, Janemba, Dirty Talk, South American House, Mu.Too, Get High Music and other labels. Balthazar & JackRock teamed up with italian top duo Dandi & Ugo for the dancefloor filler "Bulgaro Business". The record was heavy supported by Richie Hawtin, Dubfire, Umek, Mark Knight, Spartaque and many others, and Sisko Electrofanatik's remix hit #3 in Beatport's minimal chart. Their track "Dupka" also entered the minimal chart at #37, and the remix by the Istanbul top artist - Ahmet Sendil charted great in Techno section. The track was also featured at many radio stations worldwide.
In November 2010 Balthazar was voted "Best techno/minimal/trance DJ of the Year" @ Awards.bg - the largest official DJ poll in Bulgaria ever.
Right now Balthazar is focusing on many new underground dance productions. He's also taking his time to dj every weekend and promote events.