Kriikku's Kraft

Kari Kriikku is hardly a household name, but he should be. He is a clarinetist of astonishing agility and expressive imagination. He's beginning to develop a higher American profile, thanks to the support of Finnish compatriots such as Esa-Pekka Salonen and Osmo Vänskä: he made a memorable appearance at Mostly Mozart two summers ago, playing the Mozart concerto, and in February he'll unfurl Magnus Lindberg's rapturously lyrical Clarinet Concerto with Alan Gilbert and the New York...