Dimitar Nenov is one of the major figures of the second generation of Bulgarian composers, as well as one of the creators of the Bulgarian national music style. He studied piano privately with A. Stoyanov (1919-1920) and majored in architecture in Dresden (1920-1925), while continuing his music studies with private teachers: piano with K. Felling, theory and composition with T. Baumer and P. Buethner. In Dresden, Nenov was active as a professional musician (1925-1927), but on his return to Bulgaria he took a civil service position as architect (1927-1931). Even though such diversity was characteristic of his creative development, the musician in him proved stronger, and Nenov took advanced courses in piano with E. Petry (1931) and received a diploma in Bologna (1932). Subsequently, he joined the faculty of the State Academy of Music where he taught piano, and launched his career as concert performer in Bulgaria and abroad as pianist and member of chamber ensembles. In the end of the 1930s Nenov was also musical editor at Radio Sofia.

D. Nenov experienced an active artistic evolution. In the 1920s he promoted the expressive tendencies in the Bulgarian music with his chamber works and symphonies (First Symphony, 1922; Ballade for orchestra, 1924, Four Sketches for Large Orchestra, 1926). In the 1930s the composer established his interpretation of the national musical style, embodied in works such as the Piano Concerto (1936). The mature style of Nenov is represented in three genres of music: symphonic music (Rhapsodic Fantasy, 1940, Second Ballad for Piano and Orchestra (1943); music for voice and orchestra (six suites for voice and chamber orchestra, the secular oratorio Christmas, 1939, Trakia Suite for soprano, women’s choir and orchestra, 1940), and piano music (from the Variations, 1931 through the Miniatures, 1945).