We’re thrilled to be performing three of Cecilia McDowall’s works at our upcoming concert, Into Spring: East Meets West. In anticipation, we interviewed her – during the conversation, we explored her memories of singing with Sir David Willcocks, the impact that our St Matthew Passion had on her, and the inspiration she’s drawn from Russian Orthodox music.
TBC: We know you’re a composer with a global perspective and that you’ve previously immersed
yourself in an Arabic sound-world in The Girl From Aleppo. This programme features a number of
works influenced by the Russian Orthodox Church – has this music had an impact on you and your
compositions?
CM: “I really love immersing myself in the music of different cultures and I find it interesting how
harmonic, rhythmic or textural subtleties can find their way into one’s music. My mother taught
Russian and took parties of schoolchildren, and later, adults, to Russia and I often went with her. But
in the sixties and seventies, hearing church music in Moscow and Leningrad (as it then was) was not
really possible but ever since then I have been fascinated by all things Russian, in particular literature
and music.”
TBC: Do you have any favourite memories of singing with our previous Musical Director Sir David
Willcocks at Westminster Abbey?
CM: “I was at school in Victoria (Grey Coat Hospital) and we sang in Westminster Abbey for every special occasion. Our school choir was invited every year to sing the ‘ripieno’ in the St Matthew Passion with the Abbey choir and Sir David Willcocks conducted us a couple of times … he delighted us with his
lightness of touch and encouragement, such an inspiration. One year Sir David Willcocks conducted
us in a combined schools’ performance of ‘Samson’ in the Central Hall, a hymn book’s throw from
Westminster Abbey.”
TBC: Do you remember your first experience of hearing only a choir (ie without accompaniment) live, or do you have any specific childhood memory of this? If so, where was it and how did it make you feel?
CM: “Yes, we were at a candlelit carol service at my mother’s old Oxford College one year where the choir sang Britten’s Hymn to the Virgin. In that semi-darkness I was entranced by the delicate simplicity of this tender carol (which Britten wrote when he was only sixteen!) Even as a teenager I was mesmerised by the structure … a dialogue between the main body of singers and a solo quartet of voices of extraordinary beauty. An experience seared in my memory.”
TBC: One of your driving desires as a composer is to communicate with your audience. Do you think
that intimate performances in smaller venues with less accompaniment can communicate more
deeply than those with larger ensembles accompanying a choir?
CM: “That’s right, communicating with the performer and listener is so important, isn’t it, and there are
some works which can be spellbinding in an intimate venue but other works which demand a
broader canvas in which to present themselves and I feel this experience can be just as profound.
The performance of the Bach Choir’s War Requiem last October, in that vast acoustic of Westminster
Cathedral, brought a spine-tingling intimacy to the haunting opening of that work. I found the whole
performance deeply moving.”
TBC: You’ve previously mentioned in interviews that Bach is a composer you could never do without.
Do you have a favourite of Bach’s choral works?
CM: “Well, that’s a difficult one to answer … I have so many! But if I were to name but one it would be the
St Matthew Passion. I heard this first when I was taken as a five-year-old to the Royal Festival Hall to hear the Bach Choir sing the work; my father played principal flute and my mother sang in the choir.
At that time, the conductor was Reginald Jaques. It was an annual pilgrimage for several years up to
when Sir David Willcocks took over in 1960. An experience close to my heart.”
TBC: What do you do in your leisure time outside of composing?
CM: “Ah that’s an interesting question! I love gardening, passionately really, visiting gardens, visiting art
galleries, going to plays, the ballet, reading and … when I’m feeling really energetic … playing squash.”
TBC: What music are you working on currently?
CM: “I’m writing a work which has been jointly commissioned by the Gustav Vasa Chamber Choir in Stockholm and the Exeter Philharmonic Choir in Exeter. The whole cantata is called The Weather Book and takes a look at the climate from different perspectives. I have worked with the wonderful poet and librettist, Kate Wakeling on this. The Gustav Vasa choir’s part of the work focuses on the Swedish scientist, Anders Celsius … Celsius Rising. While we were exploring ideas for rest of this work we discovered that Exeter is the home of the Met Office. So Kate has very cleverly drawn on archive material housed there all to do with Captain Fitzroy, famous of course for his expedition with Darwin and Beaufort on his HMS Beagle, but who also devised the Shipping Forecast and wrote a wonderful book about ‘weather’. The work will be performed in its entirety in Exeter in the autumn this year.”
You can find out more about Cecilia and keep up with her on her website here. To hear three of her works live, Gaude et Laetare; Easter Light and Candlemas, join us at Into Spring: East Meets West in the gorgeous Holy Trinity Sloane Square on Thursday 6 March – buy your tickets here now.