Bernhard Crusell

Bernhard Henrik Crusell (15 October 1775 – 28 July 1838) was a Finland-Swedish clarinetist, composer and translator, “the most significant and internationally best-known Finnish-born classical composer and indeed, – the outstanding Finnish composer before Sibelius”. Early life and training Crusell was born in Uusikaupunki (Nystad), Finland, into a poor family of bookbinders. His grandfather, Bernhard Kruselius had learned the trade of bookbinding in Turku and Stockholm, then settled in Pori where he fathered nine children, including Crusell’s father Jakob, who also became a bookbinder. In 1765, after Jakob completed his apprenticeship, he moved to Uusikaupunki and married Helena Ylander, but she died about one year later. In 1769 he married Margaretha Messman. The couple had four children, but Bernhard was the only one who lived to become an adult. Later in life Crusell described this period of his life, writing in the third person: In his little town of birth there was only one person who had an active interest in music: a shop assistant who could be heard in the evenings playing the flute for his own amusement. One night, the four-year-old Berndt was sitting in the street, leanin