“Michael Rusinek loves a challenge,” writes Andrew Druckenbrod in Thursday’s (11/29) Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “It’s not enough that he prevailed in a highly competitive classical music world, punctuated by becoming the principal clarinetist of the renowned Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra (in 1998). When he gives master classes around the world, he pushes himself to learn and use the native language. And he will give it his all to beat you in golf and hockey. (He is Canadian, so the latter is serious business.) … But Mr. Rusinek has been handed a monumental challenge leading up to a concert this weekend: to solo in a well-known clarinet concerto but on a different instrument. It was in late summer when [PSO Music Director Manfred] Honeck asked him to solo in Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto in A Major on the obscure basset clarinet instead of the standard one. The name makes it seem like not much of a change, but it is. … Just getting the ancient instrument was trying. ‘My hunt began in earnest at the beginning of September,’ [Rusinek] says. … Once Mr. Rusinek got his hands on the basset, he found his fingers had to be retrained. … That meant Mr. Rusinek rarely saw the light of day on the PSO’s recent European tour. ‘He took it on the tour and was practicing in the hotels all the time,’ says Mr. Honeck.”
Posted November 29, 2012
