A Lifetime in Music

Government House was alive to the sound of music this week as Wendy McDowell collected her British Empire Medal from the Lieutenant Governor.

Sir John Lorimer presented Mrs McDowell with her BEM for her outstanding contribution to music and drama across the Isle of Man, in front of her friends and family before the evening took a music turn.

Coming from a musical family, Mrs McDowell’s sister played with Ivy Benson’s band, her father was a Cleveland Medal winner and her grand mother was a choir member, while her children and grandchildren are all musically inclined.

‘I first competed in the guild, I think about 1946, or something like that, so if you can think back, that’s rather a long time ago and since then I’ve been involved as a teacher, performer, choir conductor and so on,’ said Mrs McDowell.

In that time, she said she has only missed it when she was living off-island in London.

Mrs McDowell and her late husband Wylie, fine singer and comedic actor in his own right, spent many happy years together, including over 17 years entertaining visitors to the island with their holiday shows at The Majestic.

Despite all her years involved with the Guild, Mrs McDowell admitted that she ‘didn’t actually like very much taking part myself’.

She said: ‘I preferred, well I like to accompany people, really, I’m not a solo pianist but I love accompanying and I love conducting choirs. I loved all the time I had with Ballakermeen with the choirs, the instrumentalists and so on, it was a wonderful time and the guild has always been with me really for as long as I can remember, things.

While loving the tradition of the Guild, especially the Cleveland Medal, Mrs McDowell said she is happy to see the changes introduced in recent years to include new classes, saying the event ‘has to move with the times’.

As well as her long history in music, Mrs McDowell was chair of the performing arts in the Arts Council for 10 years during which time the Villa Marina was refurbished and Ballakermeen Studio Theatre was opened.

She said: ‘We had been looking to get a studio theatre for some years and this was a compromise really with the school and it seems to be working quite nicely now and it’s, I think, it’s gone from strength to strength.

‘We started the shows at Ballakermeen in 1974, with Janet Norris and we had shows every two years. So a lot of the young people, well they’re not so young now I have to say, remember their time at Ballakermeen, which shows they were in and we had some wonderful shows and I think the last one before I retired was Blood Brothers, which I think we all feel was th best one.

‘We had a wonderful cast and so many good young people taking part, instrumentally as well as onstage and a lot of those young people are still performing and doing so well in the musical life.’

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Mrs McDowell also gives her time to play the organ St Peter’s Church in Onchan where she has been involved with the choir for about 60 years.

She said: ‘I actually started having lessons while I had my children at home and I wasn’t teaching and I really took to it and I love it.’

With Christmas not too far away now, Mrs McDowell she is rather partial to The Bleak Midwinter, which she makes sure is played every year.

Mrs McDowell is still actively involved in the island’s music scene.