Ukrainian pianist Ruslan Ramazanov graduated with a doctoral degree in piano performance from the National Music Academy in Kyiv, Ukraine while also performing as a piano soloist with regional orchestras throughout Ukraine. At the beginning of the war, he and his wife Olga left Ukraine to save their family. They and their two sons, Vlad and Robert (named after Robert Schumann), first settled in Tallahassee, Florida, where they lived for a year. My wife, Dr. Jean Anderson, became aware of Ruslan because a singer with whom she was making a recording needed some songs transposed and completely randomly hired Ruslan to transpose them. He did quick and excellent work and it was only later they learned that, at the time, he was still in Ukraine. Both Jean and Felicia Galivanes (soloist for the recording) heard Ruslan’s beautiful playing and began working to relocate him to Boston where he is currently on the Boston Conservatory collaborative piano staff, playing for student and faculty recitals, and working to expand his solo presence in the US. Ruslan and his family are very grateful to the American people for the great assistance they provide to Ukraine and Ukrainians. Jean and I would add that knowing the family and witnessing their intrepid courage and strength has been the most inspiring experience in our lives.
—David Small
Baritone David Small continues to enjoy a vibrant career in opera and concert, having performed over 70 different roles in nearly 60 operas, including Rigoletto, Tosca (Scarpia), Traviata (Germont), Bohème (Marcello), and Il barbiere di Siviglia (Figaro, which he performed well over 100 times). He has been featured as soloist with the Cincinnati May Festival Orchestra, Austin Symphony, St. Louis Symphony, Rochester Philharmonic, and Fort Wayne Philharmonic in works such as Elijah, Vaughan Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem, Brahms’s Ein Deutsches Requiem, Bloch’s Sacred Service, and Szymanowski’s Stabat Mater. Small has collaborated with conductors James Conlon, Anton Coppola, Peter Bay, Valery Ryvkin, Victor DeRenzi, Dr. Robert Larsen, and many others. An avid recitalist, he has performed recitals with Anton Nel, Jean Anderson, Joachim Reinhuber, Steve Wogaman, John Novacek, and Eugene Cline, and has sung Schubert’s complete Winterreise 13 times (and counting).
Small retired from the University of Texas at Austin and moved to Boston in 2020. He was invited to join the voice faculty of Boston Conservatory at Berklee in 2021, where he teaches singing, performance seminars, and a course he designed called The Mindful Performer. In 2011, he was selected as one of four NATS Master Teachers, and his students have been finalists in the Metropolitan Opera National auditions and the International Verdi Baritone Competition, among others. He earned a Bachelor of Music in voice performance from DePauw University’s School of Music while studying with Thomas Fitzpatrick (protégé of American baritone, Mack Harrell) and earned an Artist Diploma in opera and an Master of Music in voice performance from the University of Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music, under the tutelage of the great Italian basso Italo Tajo.
