Plovdiv once-bright greens and blues. Torah scrolls are kept in the gilded Aron-ha-Kodesh. The Plovdiv Drama Theatre is a successor of the first professional theatre group in Bulgaria founded in 1881. The Plovdiv Puppet Theatre, founded in 1948, remains one of the leading institutions in this genre. The Plovdiv Opera was established in 1953. Another pillar of Plovdiv's culture is the Philharmonic, founded in 1945. Soloists such as Dmitri Shostakovich, Sviatoslav Richter, Mstislav Rostropovich, Yuri Boukov, and Mincho Minchev have worked with the Plovdiv Philharmonic. The orchestra has toured in almost all of the European countries. The Trakiya Folklore Ensemble, founded
Trolleybuses in Plovdiv the operator is a private company, the city lost the opportunity to acquire 65 mln lv EU funding for purchasing approximately 100 brand-new trolleybuses.The system was officially closed on 1 October 2012 although some trolleybuses continued operation for a few more weeks.Currently there is no trolleybus movement and the municipality has issued an order for dismantling the overhead network. The sole Plovdiv trolleybus line was: , the Plovdiv trolleybus fleet had 47 trolleybuses: Trolleybuses in Plovdiv The Plovdiv trolleybus system () was a part of the public transport network of the city and municipality of Plovdiv, the second most populous