Martin Rummel - Bach: Cello Suites (2011/2020)

J.S. Bach's Six Suites for Solo Cello are the subject of great discussion, conjecture, and even argument, particularly within the cello-playing community. Yet these now venerated compositions were almost completely unknown just over a century ago. It was a young Pablo Casals who discovered an edited edition of the suites and brought them back to their rightful status. One of the primary sources for debate is that no original Bach manuscript exists; all of the extant manuscripts are in fact copies from different individuals. This Paladino Music disc claims to be the first recording made using the manuscript of Johann Peter Kellner, perhaps the individual who produced his manuscript the closest to the time of the original composition. Performing is cellist Martin Rummel. With so many recordings of the suites being produced, and with cellists ever on the lookout for ways to distinguish their own performances, Rummel, with Kellner manuscript in hand, goes in a completely different direction. His playing is highly desirable not because of what he does to the music, but because of what he does not do. Rummel's playing is as straight-forward, unadorned, and unfettered as historians hope Kellner's manuscript is. Absent are all of the incessant tempo shifts, bizarre accents, peculiar bowings, and over-ornamentation that are present on so many other recordings. Rummel plays the music, nothing more and nothing less. The result is entirely satisfying. He is technically solid, with pristine intonation, clear articulation, and transparency of sound. Paladino's recorded sound is likewise brilliant in its simplicity, though it does seem to capture a bit of a twang on the instrument's A-string.