Pasha Hristova

Little if any documentation of the details behind the cause of the crash has been released. The investigation into the matter was quickly placed under wraps. What is certain is that the plane in question had just come out of an extensive overhaul that took months to finish. An irresponsible technical error was made during the overhaul: the cables for the ailerons were incorrectly connected (left cable to right aileron and vice versa). Thus, when the pilots tried to straighten the plane, they ended up tilting it further, resulting in a crash at an extremely low altitude during take-off. According to an official report (made public only in 2001, and thanks to the efforts of a journalist from the Bulgarian newspaper "24 hours"), lack of expertise was said to be the culprit - the procedure was carried out by technicians lacking practical experience and using two separate design plans.

In 1971, she was due for a flight to Algeria where she would have toured with the Sofia Orchestra and other colleagues, including well-known stage singers Mariya Neykova, Boris Gudjunov and folk music singer Yanka Rupkina. As the plane was taking off, it rapidly lost altitude, hit the ground headfirst, broke in half and its front exploded and went up in flames. Pasha and Nikolay Arabadzhiev were in the front seats and died almost immediately (all in all 30 people were killed, including the entire crew). When Pasha died, she was carrying her second child, from Arabadzhiev. After being identified, Pasha was buried at Central Sofia Cemetery, in the catholic parcel.

At that same time, Pasha auditioned for The Stage Singers School for the Bulgarian National Radio. She was accepted for her remarkable voice and despite a strong lisp that was subsequently treated surgically. With the help of her teacher, she found work as a soloist (after being denied a position in the Sofia Orchestra) in the Labour Corps Ensemble. Her first great success was at the 1967 Sochi festival in the Soviet Union, where she won first prize and a gold medal. In 1968 she was accepted into the Sofia Orchestra, and she worked with them for the rest of her career. The then-conductor and leader of the band, Nikolay "Bebo" Kuyumdzhiev, was soon replaced by Nikolay "Fucho" Arabadzhiev, with whom Pasha collaborated productively. He was a conductor, composer, pianist and clarinetist. They fell deeply in love and basically lived in a common law marriage until their deaths. She would spend the following years touring Bulgaria and various other countries, primarily in what was then the Soviet bloc. In 1970 she won third prize at the Golden Stag Festival in Braşov, Romania, first prize for the song "Яворова пролет" ("Yavor Spring", yavor being a word for the sycamore tree and also a Bulgarian male name) (music by Svetozar Rusinov) in the radio competition "Spring", and at the all-Bulgarian Golden Orpheus Festival, the Grand Prize was awarded to "Повей, ветре" and first prize to "Една българска роза" (music by Dimitar Valchev), both performed by Pasha Hristova. In 1971, her performance of "Този дивен свят" (A Bulgarian adaptation of "Dziwny jest ten świat") won first prize at the Sopot International Song Festival in Poland. Finally, her song "Бяла песен" ("White Song") won the Bulgarian "Melody of the year" television contest in 1972, shortly after her death.

Parashkeva Hristova Stefanova (Bulgarian: Парашкева Христова Стефанова), known artistically as Pasha Hristova (Bulgarian: Паша Христова) (16 July 1946 - 21 December 1971) was a Bulgarian singer, best known for performing one of Bulgaria's most popular songs "Една българска роза" ("A Bulgarian Rose"). Some of the other songs she was famous for are "Повей, ветре" ("Blow, Oh Wind"), "Този дивен свят" ("This Wondrous World", a take on Czesław Niemen's "Dziwny jest ten świat") and "Янтра" ("Yantra"). Her brief but meteoric career took off in the late 1960s. In the short time between 1967 and 1971, she won a number of prestigious awards at Bulgarian and international music festivals. She died young in a plane crash in 1971, pregnant with her second child.