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Swiss-German clarinetist
Eduard Brunner was notable for collaborations with top-quality chamber groups, for adventurous recordings, and perhaps especially for his commitment to contemporary music. Born in Basel, Switzerland, in 1939, he studied with pioneering French clarinetist
Louis Cahuzac in Paris until
Cahuzac's death in a motorcycle crash. The fundamentals of his professional life were common enough in pattern: he spent many years as first clarinetist of the
Bavarian Radio Symphony during the conductorship of
Rafael Kubelik, later moving on to a professorship at the Hochschüle für Musik in the west German city of Saarbrücken. Along the way came rounds of the top European festivals and master classes at the likes of the Marlboro Music Festival in the U.S. state of Vermont.
Brunner commissioned many of the contemporary standards of clarinet music, including concertos by Edison Denisov,
Jean Françaix,
Ernest Bloch, and Cristóbal Halffter, but he was also an enthusiastic exponent of clarinet standards by the likes of
Spohr,
Weber, and Stamitz. His recordings, more than 250 in number, appeared on a variety of labels, with a concentration of them appearing on the avant-garde jazz/classical German label
ECM. Perhaps most characteristic were
Brunner's chamber music collaborations, in which he often joined with critically acclaimed artists of a somewhat intellectual cast:
Alfred Brendel, the
Végh Quartet, and
Yuri Bashmet. In 2007
Brunner issued a disc of contemporary Swiss clarinet music on the small Musiques Suisses label; the disc included an interview with
Brunner by Max Nyffeler. Remaining active as he neared his eighth decade,
Brunner followed that up with one of several recordings he made of wind chamber music by German composer Harald Genzmer.
Brunner died in Munich at the age of 77 in 2017.