While you may not have heard of Vardo Rumessen, his reputation
in Estonia is very high. He is perhaps best known for performing
the work of his fellow countrymen, a good deal of 20th
century music, and particularly composers such as Eduard Tubin.
He is now one of the elder statesmen of Estonian music, and
although his interpretations are frequently imbued with a certain
amount of artistic license he is certainly not the only Estonian
musician to ‘improve’ compositions where opinion dictates they
might benefit. My inside sources also tell me he is sometimes
to be seen riding around Tallinn’s Kadriog park on a bicycle.
Far more significantly, after first performing this music in
1977 he has now finally produced a commercial release of Bach’s
Hästitempereeritud Klaver, I osa.
I’ve been hearing plenty of piano versions of this keyboard
masterpiece in recent years, and the idea of receiving a new
recording which would open my ears all over again was far from
my mind when I first saw this release. Packaged in a nicely
produced DVD-sized book, the two CDs are mounted on the inside
cover boards held by those foam ‘nipples’. The book itself has
an interesting essay by Vardo Rumessen on The Well-Tempered
Clavier in Estonian and English on glossy paper, and some
nice illustrations. The first impression is that it might have
been aimed at some kind of tourist market, which may indeed
be the case, but either way it is a nice artefact and has an
aura of faux-antique quality which will sit nicely on faux-antique
coffee tables.
Rumessen’s view is not one of authentic performance practice,
but is one which extends the line which sees the WTC as
a kind of springboard for Western Music thereafter: “an encyclopaedia
of polyphony that became the foundation of all that followed
in music.” He is not the only pianist to take this viewpoint,
but hearing this WTC set my own trains of thought spinning
through all kinds of spaces. I think we’re at an interesting
point when it comes to Bach on the piano, and The Well
Tempered Clavier in particular. Pianists have been recording
it for years, and interpretations range from the magic of Edwin
Fischer, the eccentric and sometimes wilful genius of Glenn
Gould, through the poetic Sviatoslav Richter, and the more romantic
but highly attractive and intelligent playing of Angela Hewitt.
This in itself is a springboard of various approaches and traditions
which can be an inspiration, but also a muffling duvet stuffed
down the voice of originality. Pianists who want to express
this music with their own voice will always have to cope with
comparisons with their predecessors, but even finding your own
individual things to say on this music is now something of a
challenge. The question is, is Bach subject to the law of diminishing
returns?
No doubt unconsciously, Vardo Rumessen has dealt with this question,
and risen to this challenge. Through the years he has clearly
developed his own depth of vision on each prelude and fugue,
and the cycle as a whole. This WTC Bk1 is both attractive,
individual and original in numerous unexpected ways. Yes, there
are comparisons to be made. The fugue of the great Prelude
and Fugue in C sharp minor for instance owes much to Richter
in its extended slowness, Rumessen pushing the boundaries even
further and at six minutes adding significantly even to Richter’s
timing. The quality in Rumessen’s playing and his intelligent
approach to Bach is apparent from the outset, the first Prelude
in C major both spreading fine harmonic sonorities and holding
up the ‘every note is melodic’ principle. What you often hear
in Rumessen’s fugues is a clear, unfussy, modern approach which
carries you along in a sort of state of objective grace. He
doesn’t go in overly for overt lyricism, but neither are his
melodic shapes ungraceful. He doesn’t go in for extremes of
rubato, but neither is his attitude to expression in tempo wooden
or static. The crisp articulation of the C minor Prelude
is miles away from Glenn Gould’s distinctive recording,
but the ways the melodic notes are thrown between each hand
have their little seed planted from Gould, Rumessen adding micro
‘messa di voce’ rise and fall shapes with each off-beat, creating
intensity and texture as well as pointing out the significant
notes. The C minor Fugue is another crisply shaped statement,
the melodic shapes defined by their dynamics as much as by subtle
variety of articulation and note duration.
I’ve been listening carefully to try to divine the Rumessen
‘secret’, and to avoid a blow by blow written account of the
entire recording I will point out a few highlights. The simple
grace of both the Prelude in E flat minor and the Prelude
in C sharp minor is quite magical, seeming to strip away
a layer of that player-Bach interface which can stand between
the listener and the purity of the music. The following C sharp
minor fugue I have already mentioned, and once you have become
accustomed to the slow tempo its sheer length and gently gathering
power builds a structure of vast magnificence – this counts
as well for the E flat minor fugue, though not in quite as extreme
a fashion. Where the music usually dances, such as with the
Prelude in D minor and the Prelude in E major,
Rumessen is more formal than extrovert, the pace fairly restrained
and winning in clarity rather than in sheer excitement. The
D minor fugue also points to his take on ornaments, which are
more often than not played with carefully rhythmic accuracy
rather than as trill effects. Lovely little touches occur in
the Prelude in E flat major, real legato here taking
over in the chorale second section. The contrasts in texture
of articulation at the opening and final section are like the
tastiest morsels in a fine dish in a posh restaurant. One aspect
with which I found a modicum of difficulty was the occasional
extra rhythmic gap Rumessen uses to point out the question-answer
pattern of certain fugue themes. This is the case with the E
flat major fugue, which suffers a little through a certain amount
of lumpiness as this feature is continued through the more complex
interactions of the counterpoint. He can also be a little choppy,
the four-square rhythms and accentuations of the Fugue in
A minor perhaps too tightly articulated for their own good.
Rumessen however proves he can generate plenty of energy and
forward momentum in examples such as the Prelude in F major
and the Fugue in E minor, which is preceded by a
prelude which has a Gould-like articulation in the ostinato
left hand.
Rumessen’s clarity and directness comes partly through accurate
and reliable definition of note durations, which the two-part
Prelude in F sharp major shows very well. He will sometimes
shorten notes more than we’re used to, as in the Prelude
in A major, but where you might lose something in terms
of a softer, more legato roundness, you gain in transparency
of texture. All of these elements are only the building
blocks, and while Rumessen’s readings are not really in the
‘romantic’ category neither do they sound mechanical or mannered.
His Bach is more than the sum of its parts, and only hearing
it can you really discover what I am trying to capture in words.
There is plenty of highly charged, almost subversively suppressed
emotion in the slow and measured development of the Fugue
in F sharp minor, and while some might apply the word ‘orchestral’
to this kind of breadth of expression I would disagree in this
case – the implication also being a kind of extra weight which
Rumessen avoids here, in fact keeping the piano texture light
throughout the 4-part polyphony. There is a beautiful slowness
to the Prelude and Fugue in B minor which make you sit
up and take note. Rumessen is good at keeping us on our toes
throughout the cycle, and I like the way this feels as if it
would work equally as a live performance as well as a recording.
Temptations to give the ‘authority’ of the music its head, in
something like the Prelude and Fugue in A minor, are
expressed more in the nature of the music than in the nature
of the playing. Rumessen is decisive, but while expressing a
personal style seems able to avoid imposing a layer of extra
ego. He avoids pomposity, even with the final cadence of the
final fugue. There is a modicum of unevenness here and there
in some of these pieces, but nothing too untoward – I think
we can allow for that kind of thing within the category of musical
‘elder statesman’. Whatever editing has been done is very professional
and invisible under normal listening conditions, and Rumessen’s
ability to deal with Bach’s technical challenges is usually
faultless.
While Bach’s Well Tempered Clavier has always been a
monumental challenge and vehicle for keyboard excellence, its
function as a medium for personal expression seems to have entered
a kind of golden age in recent years. Pianists from Daniel Barenboim,
Maurizio Pollini, Till Fellner and Roger Woodward to Angela
Hewitt – twice, all show how diverse are the ways and means
of expressing Bach’s marvellous legacy. While there are always
going to be recordings which are more successful than others
this Well Tempered Clavier proves once again that it
can hold a new and different touch to those we already know
and love. The recording production for this release is very
good, the well-prepared Steinway piano sound sympathetically
clear without being uncomfortably close. Vardo Rumessen’s WTC
Bk1 is not in a competition to be ‘the best’, and in many
ways stands aloof from direct comparison with other recordings.
In my opinion it is rather special, and not only for opening
my ears to new perspectives in this Panglossian polyphonic masterpiece.
Dominy Clements
Vardo Rumessen (piano) 
