On 30 July 2016 (last Saturday of July), from 8 p.m., on Perelik Peak near Smolyan, was held the XIth International Perelik Еco Jazz Festival “The Sound of Silence”, organized by Perelik Infrastructure Company, with the support of The Atlantic Club of Bulgaria.

The event is unique for its environmental focus, which combines the idea of improvisation and creativity with environmental protection as a fundamental value. The event takes place at 2191 meters above sea  level, at the foot of Perelik Peak, on the stage of the “Mechata kashta” (“Bear’s House”). The 2016 festival was held under the auspices of the US Ambassador to Bulgaria, H.E. Eric Rubin. Every year, the event gathers a large number of ambassadors, businessmen, prominent intellectuals and lovers of music, and is widely covered in the media.

Various jazz musicians from France, the United States, Serbia and Bulgaria took part in the 2016 festival. The Bulgarian scene was represented by the international instrumental cinematic punk jazz band Badlam Club, Hot Club de Plovdiv, who offered the audience to enjoy gypsy jazz and manouche, as well as by Nikola Goryalov, Ludmil Krumov and Velislav Stoyanov, in quartet with the famous US jazz pianist Ryan Hanseler.