Jan. 22--An Atlanta-based website, artsatl.com, reported Thursday that Keith Buncke, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra's highly regarded principal bassoon, has won the audition for principal bassoon of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and will assume the post here this fall.
CSO Association spokeswoman Celeste Wroblewski would not confirm or deny Buncke's appointment. "We will make an announcement when we have a signed contract," she said.
The CSO's first bassoon chair was occupied since 1997 by David McGill, who left the orchestra in August to take up a fulltime faculty post at Northwestern University.
Buncke, who's only 21 and is in his senior year of study at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, is the second Atlanta Symphony principal wind player the CSO has tapped in recent months.
Atlanta's principal flute, Christine Smith, is serving as guest principal flute for Muti's remaining CSO subscription concerts this month and is also scheduled to play the orchestra's Carnegie Hall tour next week. She substituted for the now-departed Mathieu Dufour as guest principal flute on the CSO's European tour under Muti last fall.
