A man who can pull out all the stops

ORGANISTS are the invisible men (and sometimes women) of the music world, seen from the back if seen at all. You know they're there, secreted in some distant organ loft, because you hear the noise.

But they're the servant of their instrument. They don't make headlines.

So it was a rare event the other year when the organist of Westminster Abbey became front-page news. And the reason wasn't the brilliance of his keyboard technique or his way with Choral Matins. He'd been sacked in what became a drawn-out issue that crawled through the courts, did nobody much credit, and resulted in Martin Neary packing his bags for America. But that left the Abbey with a problem.

The organist's job there is arguably the most prestigious in the universe of church music, but the Neary affair had attr- acted such bad publicity (with the Dean of Westminster cast in the role of villain-persecutor) that it wasn't obvious who would want it.

Of the two best candidates, Stephen Cleobury at King's Cambridge was probably best off staying put, while James O'Donnell, just down the road at the Roman Catholic Westminster Cathedral, was - well - Roman Catholic. The Abbey hadn't had one of those running its music since the Reformation. What's more, O'Donnell was devout. Even in these ecumenical times, such things can be tricky.

But, for once in the history of religion, common sense prevailed and O'Donnell got the job. He was selected in a businesslike way, through headhunters (post-Neary, the Dean and Chapter are anxious not to put a foot wrong). And, at 38, he can look forward to a long stay in office, with royal weddings/ funerals lining up and, barring political mishap, the fair prospect of a coronation.

He has just moved in, exchanging a maisonette in Pimlico (the official Cathedral organist's residence) for a handsome house that runs down one side of the Abbey's Little Cloister. And with a dormitory of bedrooms, medieval features, a designer kitchen (brand new - that's how much they wanted him) and views across a garden fountain to the House of Commons, it's a perk of no small order.

"I'm extremely fortunate to be here," says O'Donnell diplomatically and similarly anxious not to put a foot wrong as he finds his way about the Abbey precincts.

Every day, processing out of Evensong along the cloister to the choir-room, he walks over the bones of his predecessors, a whole batch of whom are buried together by the South Door. That's a sobering experience. But as O'Donnell knows perfectly well, it's the bones which aren't buried that cause real concern.

"All I can say about what happened with Martin Neary is that it was a distressing episode for everybody, but it's in the past and now we have to look to the future. There isn't time in a place like this, with a busy turnover of services and music, to look back.

And though the choir has been through a long period of instability, morale is fine.

Everyone's keen to get going again and I've been made extremely welcome.

What more can I say?"

Perhaps a word about the Dean?

"I find him totally supportive. He takes an active interest in the music, he has an informed appreciation of the repertory, we're getting on well; and I've certainly got no regrets about coming here. I'd been at Westminster Cathedral 17 years - 12 of them as Master of the Music - which is all my working life. I went there straight from Cambridge. It was time for a change - for them as well as me. But there are very few establishments with a richer musical life than the Cathedral. And the tradition here at the Abbey is unparalleled. That's why I wanted to come."

The fact remains, though, that it's a very different tradition to the one he's been immersed in for so many years. In the Byzantine vastness of the Cathedral where wafted smells of incense and floor- polish match the combination of transcendence and municipality in the architecture (backstage always feels like a provincial town hall), the main daily service is a Sung Mass. In Latin.

At the Abbey, which sits at the heart of the Anglican establishment and functions like a well-connected Oxbridge college, the main service is Choral Evensong.

In English. That dictates a different kind of music.

"At the Cathedral we sang a lot of renaissance polyphony and unaccompanied Gregorian Chant, which was a fantastic discipline.

It made the choir sing absolutely together. And it helped develop a certain sound" - a sound you might call more Continental than English and which, in recent years, has been hugely successful on disc. O'Donnell's CDs with the Cathedral choir have been showered with awards which have turned him, and them, into hot commercial properties.

With his move to the Abbey, it's almost certain that the recording contracts, concert bookings and other trappings of success will follow him.

THE only snag is that commerce and religion make awkward partners. It was Martin Neary's mishandling of the divide in his life between professional musician and servant of the church that led to his downfall. So O'Donnell knows he has to be careful.

"But I don't actually see a conflict of roles here. Of course, the primary task of the choir is to sing the services. The discs, the concerts, the tours are a byproduct. But they're not an optional byproduct, because the singing would suffer without them. Discs and concerts are a chance for detailed work you'd never get in the daily business of preparing Evensong.

They raise the level. That can only be a good thing."

For Westminster Cathedral it was so good that one of Cardinal Hume's last official acts before his death was to petition the Pope for O'Donnell to be made a Papal Knight.

There haven't been many of those in the Abbey organ loft either.

Copyright 2000
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