Sofia Music Weeks International Festival Foundation is the organizer of the Festival. The Sofia Music Weeks International Festival was opened for the first time on 24 of May 1970. Since 1982 the Festival is a member of the European Festivals Association for Music, Theatre and Dance, in which there are more than 65 prestigious European festivals. Its main purpose is to present to the Bulgarian audience the most remarkable things from the world's and Bulgarian music art of the highest level.

Besides concerts, opera and ballet performances, the Festival programmes include also other events: scientific conferences (round-table talks) in the field of music theory, photographs exhibitions, shows of filmed operas, master classes for young musicians and singers. The Festival celebrates anniversaries of great Bulgarian and foreign composers and realize first performances of remarkable music works (including new ones). The Stage of the Young Musicians cycle gives an excellent opportunity for manifestation to talented young people from Bulgaria and abroad.

The Festival is held in Bulgaria hall (big and chamber), halls of the National Palace of Culture, the National Gallery if Fine Arts. Co-organizers of the Weeks are Sofia Municipality, Ministry of Culture, National Palace of Culture. The Festival collaborates with the foreign embassies and cultural institutes in Bulgaria.

A proof for the high authority gained by the Sofia Music Weeks is the participation in the Festival of symphony orchestras, such as the Vienna, Berlin and Leningrad Philharmonic, opera theatres and ballet companies from Italy, France, Sweden, and other countries, conductors of world-wide eminence (Claudio Abbado, Genady Rozhdestvensky, etc.), prominent musicians and singers (Henric Shering, Leonid Kogan, Alexis Weissenberg, Janos Starker, Elena Obraszova, Mirella Freni, Pierro Capucille, etc.), world-known chamber ensembles (Virtuosi di Roma, Moscow Virtuosi, Amadeus Quartet, Smetana Quartet, etc.), and many others. The Bulgarian presence is defended with dignity by the Sofia Philharmonic, Sofia Opera, Svetoslav Obretenov Bulgarian A Capella Choir, Bulgarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and Mixed Choir, Sofia Soloists Chamber Ensemble, Dimov Quartet, choirs and orchestras from outside the capital (Plovdiv, Rousse, Varna, Bourgas), well-known musicians and singers (Mincho Minchev, Georgi Badev, Anton Dikov, Nikolay Giaourov, Rayna Kabaivanska, Alexandrina Milcheva, etc.).