Eamonn Dougan, Jersey Chamber Orchestra's Chief Conductor, chats with us about why music matters!
Eamonn, so good to be here! Talk to us about your collaboration with Jersey Chamber Orchestra.
My first my introduction to Jersey Chamber Orchestra and Music in Action came through the leader of the orchestra, Anna Smith. We had met at a music festival in Cornwall. Anna was leading the orchestra and I was conducting the Mass in B minor by J. S. Bach. When Jersey Chamber Orchestra were looking for a new conductor, Anna thought I might be the right person. And so, it proved to be a very happy meeting, actually.
The mix of local players, students and professional players. It's important that you understand the vibe for the Jersey Chamber Orchestra, and we make a real effort to make sure that the rehearsals are fun, enjoyable, but also we're always working as every orchestra should be. We work tremendously hard to make it as good as it can be. But the point is that it is a collaboration between all these different people and I think that's one of the things that makes it unique. I don't work with any other orchestras like this. And that's part of the appeal of it, actually; it is the bringing together of these different elements.
Why do you think music matters so much?
So many things that one could say. It's difficult to pick out one reason… But something that strikes me currently in the wake of the pandemic, when people weren't able to perform together. And although that seems maybe it was a bit of a while ago, I think we're still seeing some of the hangover, the effects from that, both in terms of audiences, but also in terms of the performers themselves and just how much it's valued to be in a room together making music. The social aspects of it is something that is spoken about and I think it's really important to acknowledge that making music together is a is a community act. It helps build connections and friendships which happen at almost at a sort of deeper level than one might necessarily acknowledge until it's not there.
And I think that was true for all musicians. And what I see now is that it's just how much it brings to people in terms of this sense of community, both for the players but for the audience as well. Live performance is a very powerful thing and not something that one can necessarily quantify. It's not something that one can manufacture. It comes from people having a shared experience. The arts have not been supported for many, many years, not properly, by successive governments. And it's really important for us to cherish and nurture the arts, music, theatre, visual arts, because they do bring so much well-being to so many people's lives.
And this is one of the great things about Music in Action, that the charity is being proactive in making sure that music is introduced to children at a young age because that's when you need to get hold of people. All the education projects and outreach projects, they need to happen at grassroots level with children of a young age so they experience and start to develop that love of music at an early age. And with the outreach projects that Music in Action perform alongside each of the Jersey Chamber Orchestra projects, you see that happening, the excitement in the room when we've got these activities on. It’s brilliant energy. To see hundreds of children together experiencing and being involved in these concerts and workshops, it's very, very rewarding, and quite rightly all this is at the heart of what Music in Action are all about.
You are involved in so many different activities. What's special about orchestral conducting and what's special about singing for you?
That’s a very interesting question. With the choral activity, this is something I've been doing for a long time now, working at a high level. I've got a degree of expertise with that, which is the result of long experience. What I'm really enjoying now is being able to bring the two elements together, now that my orchestral experience is coming up to that sort of level. And that's leading to some really nice and exciting projects. At the end of 2024 I made my debut conducting the Philharmonia Orchestra in London at the Festival Hall. That was a real thrill, to conduct an orchestra of that calibre, in a packed out Festival Hall. There was a standing ovation at the end of the concert, and that’s so special, especially at this stage in my life now when I've just had a significant birthday last year.
It feels like things are sort of starting to come together, and it’s very rewarding to be able to bring these two different strands, singing and conducting, which have kind of existed side by side, but they're really coming together now in some very exciting opportunities.
Leading on from this feeling of joy and reward, could you name a piece or two that you associate with happiness, with real joy?
I think one of the most joyous pieces that I know is J. S. Bach's Christmas Oratorio. Nobody paints it better than Bach, but he also does joy better than anyone, I think. And the Christmas Oratorio is full of some of the most celebratory music that you'll ever hear. I still to this day remember so clearly the first time I ever performed it and I just I couldn't believe the sheer balance and joy that final chorus of the sixth cantata brings. It leaves me with a smile on my face, every time.
What can we look forward to from you next? Commissions, performances, recordings, other projects?
Lots, yes! There's some great things coming up. Alongside, the projects with Jersey Chamber Orchestra, I'm going to be conducting Chamber Choir Ireland, in a programme called the Green Road, and it's all to do with humankind's relationship with nature. So, works that reflect the wonders of nature. For me, one very exciting thing about this programme is a half-hour commission in Irish Gaelic, set on Irish poetry, by the Irish composer Eoghan Desmond. The chance to perform music the Irish language, which is not a language that I speak, unfortunately, is obviously close to my heart with my heritage, and that's something I'm really looking forward to. And after that, I've got a big tour to Australia as well directing a project out there. So I'll be out there for three weeks. Trip to New York as well. So some there's some nice conducting travel coming up this year. But, as ever, looking forward to coming back to Jersey and working with friends and colleagues there.
Live music and recorded music. You in the studio and on the concert platform. You prefer both equally?
I prefer live music. I've been lucky enough to make a lot of recordings in the years that I've been performing. It's an interesting environment, the recording studio. I think there's a real art to it.
I think it’s difficult to generate the spontaneity of a live performance in the studio. Where maybe something doesn't go exactly how you've planned it and you have to react to that and how you maybe turn that into something even more exciting and more interesting. I love the thrill of that, the challenge of it. That's something that doesn't exist in the recording studio, but, of course, that then brings other challenges as well. And the beauty of recording though is that it gives you the time and the space to repeat and to make things as close to how you've imagined it in your in your head when you're when you're studying the music and learning it, and conceiving your interpretation of it. It does give you the space to try and achieve that. So I think they are two very, very different mediums. But if you're asking me which I prefer, I I'd always go with the live performance.
And, finally, what's your favourite piece, or two, to perform as an encore with your orchestras?
I love encores, they are great fun! I like something which has got a bit of dance in it, so you send the audience out with a with a with a spring in their step. So, you know, a little Strauss waltz can always go down quite well, or a march, a Strauss polka, something like that. As long as it's got a spring in its step that'll send the audience out, humming a tune and skipping out of the hall, then you're onto a winner.