Peter Donohoe

Speaker 20:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 20:08

The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen eighty eight, and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:26

My castaway this week is a pianist. He was born thirty-five years ago in Manchester, and he was a prodigy. By the age of twelve, he was performing Beethoven's third piano concerto. His career took off internationally six years ago, when he won the joint silver medal in the International Tschaikovsky competition in Moscow. That made him a superstar in Russia. Today, he performs on all the world's major concert platforms. He's one of our most gifted and intelligent musicians. He is Peter Donahoe.

Presenter0:58

Peter, does the word prodigy make you squirm, or do you confess that's exactly what you were?

Peter Donohoe1:03

Well, I would love to know what the word prodigy means, but certainly I think that uh the majority of really successful musicians were able at a very early age to play some of the things that we work towards now.

Peter Donohoe1:15

The work that I played at the age of twelve in public, which was the Beethoven Third Concerto, I now find it a very difficult piece at the age of thirty five, whereas at that time it seemed really quite easy. In other words, I hadn't learned learned the difficulties.

Presenter1:28

But but would you say that you were born to play the piano, that it was something in you that you were born with?

Peter Donohoe1:34

Yes, yes I would.

Peter Donohoe1:36

I think if one tries to analyse that it's something to do with, first of all, a a musical ear and the other thing is of course physical coordination.

Peter Donohoe1:45

And I must say I'm very lucky with that. And and the love of the music.

Peter Donohoe1:49

We mustn't forget about. I mean, uh but I I think a lot of people who who only listen to music share that love.

Peter Donohoe1:54

Um that I have for it.

Peter Donohoe1:56

Um so there are there are many more of us than uh than actually can act that can can perform the music.

Presenter2:02

So I can imagine that that choosing eight records from your great love of music has been entirely impossible.

Peter Donohoe2:08

Totally, yes. Yes.

Presenter2:10

So how have you done it?

Peter Donohoe2:12

Well, I tried to um I tried to stick to pieces that were significant from a practical point of view in my life. And of course that whittled it down straight away to a very small number, because a lot of the music that I love is just purely that. Um I desire the ability to perform something and so I go out and learn it now. But when I was very small there were certain pieces that stick out in my memory as creating my desire to do this.

Presenter2:38

What's the first one, then?

Peter Donohoe2:40

Well, I remember um

Peter Donohoe2:42

To be quite honest, I don't know what age I was, but I was terribly young. Um, for some reason my father picked up.

Peter Donohoe2:49

Uh a wound-up gramophone.

Peter Donohoe2:51

We had no music in the house except for the piano which my mother used to play.

Peter Donohoe2:56

and this gramophone appeared, and in order to find something to play on it, he went to a market in South Manchester, which quite close to where we lived, and picked up the Emperor Concerto.

Peter Donohoe3:08

And the first record was missing from this set and I spent hours and hours trying to trying to piece together the complete work. It it didn't uh actually um occur to me at all to look at the the serial numbers on the records, or or even when it said side eight or whatever it was. Uh I just using my ears tried to work out how the piece went. And I I came to love it so much that I was really rather disappointed when I discovered there was another quarter of an hour of the piece.

Peter Donohoe3:37

That was actually the beginning of the work.

Peter Donohoe3:39

Um and uh of course it's a piece I play a lot now, but I still feel very much more comfortable starting with the passage at the beginning of my version of the music at the age of, I think, four or five, something like that.

Peter Donohoe3:52

And uh the end of the first movement of this piece was the end of the piece as far as I was concerned, so I would like to hear that passage.

Presenter4:57

Beethoven's Emperor Concerto played by Wilhelm Backhaus with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Hans Schmidt Isserstedt.

Presenter5:06

Peter, so even at the age of four you were moved by that kind of music. Was it always, though, the piano that touched something in you?

Peter Donohoe5:15

Yes, I think it was. I certainly wanted to play the piano that was in the corner of the room, and I perhaps didn't really significantly realise that there were other instruments to be played. But I do remember although I didn't differentiate between the sounds at that stage, I don't think but I I remember picking out music from the radio.

Presenter5:23

Uh

Speaker 45:23

Yeah.

Speaker 25:23

Yeah.

Peter Donohoe5:33

On that piano, by which I mean signature tunes from programmes on the radio.

Presenter5:38

So it wasn't always classical music that moved you.

Peter Donohoe5:39

No, not at all. Hardly ever at that stage.

Presenter5:42

What sort?

Peter Donohoe5:42

It was um it was mainly uh theme tunes to things like Home This Afternoon I think one of them was called and that kind of thing and occasionally a hymn from a morning service or something.

Presenter5:53

But there was no professional musicianship in the history of your family at all, but your mum plays.

Peter Donohoe5:58

Not that I'm aware of since the seventeenth century, no. Only if you've gone back that far.

Presenter6:01

Only if you've come back that fast.

Presenter6:04

Oh, really? Well, there you are, you see it without.

Peter Donohoe6:07

Yes, but my mother did play the piano, but not professionally, and that was why we had the instrument in in the room there.

Presenter6:13

And she sent you for piano lessons. Where did she send you?

Peter Donohoe6:15

A lot later, yes. In the first place, it became apparent to both my parents that I had a particular pull towards this instrument, and because my mother could play the piano, she taught me how to do it, and I had one of these strange childish obsessions. I I developed a hero on my grandparents' television in the form of Russ Conway.

Peter Donohoe6:36

And I understood I may have understood it wrongly, but I understood at that time that he didn't read music.

Peter Donohoe6:42

And I decided, as part of my hero worship, that I would never learn to read music at that stage. And so my mother had to teach me to play the piano without ever

Peter Donohoe6:51

learning to read it, to read the actual notes. And I actually believe rather strongly that that's a very significant part of my development because I think I learned to use my ears.

Peter Donohoe7:02

And of course it's a very important time of one's life in the development of any ability.

Peter Donohoe7:07

And uh I now have a very good memory and and uh a very quick learning technique and I think it was it was begun at that time.

Peter Donohoe7:15

It was three years later that I actually was persuaded that it would be a good idea if I learned to read music, and I agreed to do so only if I could leave the Wolf Cubs.

Presenter7:26

Let's have your second record then.

Peter Donohoe7:28

Well, I just mentioned Russ Conway, and this is one of the tunes I remember loving hearing him play. Exciting.

Presenter8:05

Russ Conway with side saddle. So you were packed off for music lessons. I mean, this poor music teacher, can he have been aware that he was in receipt of of world class material?

Peter Donohoe8:16

Well, certainly none of the rest of us were aware of it.

Peter Donohoe8:20

I I never thought in in those terms myself. I just wanted to play. I wasn't thinking of any kind of career at that time, and I'm not really sure that my parents were either. They just wanted me to do what I wanted to do. Has it been

Presenter8:30

Has it been very difficult for your family and friends to accept your your great success?

Peter Donohoe8:36

I don't think they've had difficulty accepting it, but they've perhaps had difficulty understanding the nature of it. Because of course, um as with all performing arts

Peter Donohoe8:46

The tendency is to give the public a certain amount of disinformation about what the lifestyle really is.

Peter Donohoe8:52

And I I suppose I was also conned into thinking that it was all glamour and and so on. I think that's the the hard bit to accept for for anyone.

Presenter9:02

Why, isn't it glamorous?

Peter Donohoe9:03

Most of it is.

Presenter9:03

Most of it is. I mean, walking onto that concert platform in your dinner jacket and all those ovations and moving people in the way that you describe, it's very camera.

Peter Donohoe9:06

concert platform in your dinner jacket.

Peter Donohoe9:11

Yeah.

Peter Donohoe9:13

Yes, that's right. But the means to that end is a lot of very, very hard work, a lot of travelling, a lot of jet lag.

Peter Donohoe9:21

And that, of course, is not glamorous. But the the love of the music is actually more important than the ovations, ultimately, I believe.

Speaker 29:22

But look

Peter Donohoe9:27

But that's not to say I don't like the evasion.

Peter Donohoe9:31

But uh I did have in my repertoire, before I learned to read music.

Peter Donohoe9:36

I had a Mozart sonata, and I really think that that bemused my first piano teacher somewhat.

Peter Donohoe9:42

partly because some one knowing a Mozart and or having not learned to read the music in the first place was something completely new to him, but also, I think, because I'd learned it so badly.

Peter Donohoe9:53

I didn't have any of the refinements whatsoever and I I added bits of my own. I was constantly twiddling around with the melody and

Presenter10:01

How did your school cope with you? I mean, if there was this great emphasis on this talent of yours?

Peter Donohoe10:08

At my primary school I was very lucky. I had a a number of very friendly members of the staff who encouraged me to to do as much as I possibly could playing, uh including in assemblies and things like that. And then later on when I went to the the second school, it was actually a a public school with um a history of a very good music department.

Peter Donohoe10:27

to which I had been guided by the various teachers in my other school.

Peter Donohoe10:31

And it was Cheatham's. At that time it was called Cheatham's Hospital School, very old, established, a central Manchester School. And later on, I think in nineteen sixty nine, it became a specialist music school.

Presenter10:43

So you were very lucky, really, to be in striking distance of exactly the right school to cope with you.

Peter Donohoe10:46

Exactly.

Peter Donohoe10:47

Absolutely. Yes, a remarkable piece of luck because of course I as far as I know, certainly at that time there were only two similar schools in this country.

Peter Donohoe10:55

And so uh it was only four miles away and it was fantastic to be able to do that.

Presenter11:00

Let's have your third record.

Peter Donohoe11:02

Well this doesn't have any particular significance to my life story, it's just a wonderful piece of music, and it's the prize song from Wagner's opera Die Meistersinger.

Speaker 411:13

I'm the one that held me on me.

Speaker 411:23

Yeah.

Speaker 411:29

The lady's as a midlife of Mosa of Gedi. So hate the men.

Speaker 411:48

And for the star resting.

Speaker 411:54

Uh

Presenter12:07

The prize song from Wagner's The Master Singers rene collo in the recording conducted by Sir George Schulte with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra and Opera Chorus.

Presenter12:16

Well, Peter, you you went on from school to uh music college and at the same time you were studying all sorts of different instruments, not just the piano.

Peter Donohoe12:24

Yes, at school uh I'd I'd started to study the violin. I was an absolutely hopeless violinist. But um because as for the usual reasons the school orchestra was short of violas, I transferred to that to the viola and became reasonably proficient in that. Played quite a lot of orchestral music later. Um but I I did a deal with the school that um they could have their viola back if I could study percussion.

Presenter12:47

Percussion

Peter Donohoe12:48

Percussion, yes. I I was very f fascinated by the louder end of the musical spectrum, if that's the right phrase. Um and uh I wanted to play all the big percussion instruments. It's just one part of one's immaturity I suppose.

Presenter13:03

You were a drum kit chap, weren't you?

Peter Donohoe13:05

Well later on I was, yes. And I I really loved it. I went off to university for one year.

Peter Donohoe13:11

before going to the Royal Northern College in Manchester.

Peter Donohoe13:15

I was remained in the North at that time, which I think is also quite important to the way my career developed. And whilst at university I became very interested in the the contemporary rock scene, which at that time was very anti-establishment of course, which of course was exactly why I wanted to get involved in it. But some of the musicians involved at that time I found very admirable from a technical point of view as well, and I still do, looking back at it.

Presenter13:44

This was the early seventies.

Presenter13:46

So you I mean it could have been Peter Donahoe rock star, could it?

Peter Donohoe13:49

Oh yeah, see I was thinking on on those lines at one stage.

Presenter13:53

You were also into jazz at one point.

Peter Donohoe13:55

Uh yes, I was I was very interested in in jazz later because I went to college in Manchester to study piano and percussion equally.

Peter Donohoe14:03

and found that the percussion playing was taking over because there was a lot of work outside the college available, and I loved being involved in orchestras. And my percussion teacher, Gilbert Webster,

Peter Donohoe14:15

was um at one time the principal uh percussion of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, but he was also a very experienced jazzer. And he did he picked on me as someone, partly because I was a pianist I suppose, someone that really should develop more improvisatory techniques. And we we really did get very heavily involved in traditional jazz.

Peter Donohoe14:36

And he had me playing the jazz kit and the vibraphone really quite well, I think. I actually feel very strongly that uh if you play and love music generally as much as you can, although inevitably you're you're going to be better at certain things than others, we we can't avoid that, but I think your experience with all the different styles

Peter Donohoe14:56

is a great asset.

Presenter14:58

Another record.

Peter Donohoe15:01

Well, because of my um interest in jars.

Peter Donohoe15:04

I felt it was a good idea to include um something that represented the best of American jazz, and it just so happens that it's something I've also recorded, and it's the Rhapsody in Blue.

Presenter16:17

Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, played by our Castaway, Peter Donohoe, with the London Sinfonetta, conducted by Simon Rattle.

Presenter16:25

Well, now, Peter, tell me about nineteen eighty two, the Moscow International Tschaikovsky Piano Competition. You were twenty nine years old, and suddenly they were chanting your name on the streets of Moscow. How did it happen?

Peter Donohoe16:38

Well, I I only ever did four co uh competitions in my life.

Peter Donohoe16:42

And I was always very lucky. I became a finalist in all of them. But I actually um jointly won this one in in Moscow with a Russian.

Peter Donohoe16:50

And

Peter Donohoe16:51

It was like a dream c uh come true, because I knew I I tried to be as realistic as possible about it, but I knew that that

Peter Donohoe16:58

Would be the the door opening to a career, assuming that I could.

Peter Donohoe17:04

I could actually deliver the guts. And of course that's the difficult bit, because immediately after a competition there there is so much hype, so many interviews and so so so many things preventing you practising and sleeping enough.

Peter Donohoe17:16

That you are under extreme pressure for at least six months. I came out of it reasonably well, I'm very pleased to say. And I think that.

Presenter17:23

Reasonably, yeah. I mean, I gather the ovation went on for a quarter of an hour.

Peter Donohoe17:28

Well, yes, actually I have to correct you there, that the evas went on for a quarter of an hour between two of the pieces.

Speaker 417:34

Oh.

Peter Donohoe17:35

Um it was actually more like two hours later on. It it's difficult to remember the precise details, but Um after the the final uh that I gave uh the jury went away to consider the verdict because I was actually the the last person to play in the finals. And that was rather an interesting uh little story actually because I was supposed to be the third out of thirteen to play and I I cut my f thumb on a beer can um just before the finals. And so a Russian doctor pronounced me unfit to play for at least another five days or something like that and so I played at the end.

Speaker 218:14

Do you think that made a difference to the results?

Peter Donohoe18:14

And we

Peter Donohoe18:15

Well, it certainly made a difference to the feeling as far as I was concerned because of course it was very significant um to me that that the result came

Peter Donohoe18:24

at least within hours of playing.

Speaker 418:26

Mm.

Peter Donohoe18:27

I don't particularly like the idea of a competition anyway, but I think that those th th they're probably inevitable.

Presenter18:34

But how else do you get noticed?

Peter Donohoe18:36

Well, if you didn't have any competitions at all, then you would get noticed in some other way, but because they're there, you have to win one in order to be noticed. It's like A levels or O levels when you want a job. And and of course the fact that you've got A levels doesn't mean to say you approve of them.

Peter Donohoe18:50

So that the fact that I won a competition doesn't mean to say I I approve of them either. It's it's the beginning of a career. I think a lot of people make the mistake of thinking that it's that it guarantees a career, and it doesn't at all, because there are so many competitions that that there are so many first prize winners.

Peter Donohoe19:07

And there's only room for a certain number of us with with extremely successful careers.

Presenter19:12

Right, let's hear your next record.

Peter Donohoe19:14

I would like to um

Peter Donohoe19:16

to suggest the um the the actual performance which at least contributed to winning the competition in Moscow, which was of the third piano concerto of Rachmaninoff, for two reasons. First of all, I I think it's one of the greatest piano concertos of all, and not only that, it represents, because it's so difficult, it represents, more than any other piece, one's achievement if one has one.

Peter Donohoe19:39

Uh the the technical demands and the emotional and um structural demands on the performer in this piece are bigger than anything else in in in the repertoire. And so to look back at this would be enormously nostalgic for me from the point of view of the things that I'd achieved.

Peter Donohoe19:56

Not only that, of course, it was the piece that came second in the final performance of the Moscow competition, preceded by the the fifteen minute stunning evasion we've already referred to.

Peter Donohoe20:06

And um it was just such an incredible evening that I'll never forget it.

Presenter21:11

Rachmaninoff's third piano concerto played by Peter Donahoe, with the USSR T V and Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Vladimir Fedosayev. You're taking quite a bit of yourself on to the island, Peter, your own recordings. Does that mean you enjoy hearing yourself?

Peter Donohoe21:26

Well in in one of the cases it's it's the only recording there is, so I have to, but uh obviously I I enjoy looking back at performances that I'm particularly happy with and and remind me of particularly happy events. But there are only three.

Presenter21:40

Anyway, you won the big one, and and Peter Donahoe, distinguished international pianist, was born, and the engagements flooded in. I mean, presumably then you were just allwhelmed with them.

Peter Donohoe21:48

Just

Peter Donohoe21:51

The nature of those engagements changes as time goes on. At first I think a lot of the promoters who are merely interested in the fact that you've recently won a competition and who basically forget about it six months later invite you to play for them. And I actually to some extent look back with uh at that with a certain amount of resentment because I don't want to be playing in front of the public because I just came from a competition. I want to be playing because they like the way I play.

Presenter22:19

But the Russians have remained true throughout this. I mean once you are a superstar, I said that earlier. It's true, isn't it? Bit of a cult, Donahoe Mars.

Peter Donohoe22:21

Yeah.

Peter Donohoe22:26

Yes, it's rather embarrassing really, but yes, yes, it it does seem to happen and and I have to say that each time I've been there since, which is now it it it it amounts to eight times I think uh it's become even more so.

Peter Donohoe22:39

It's rather like a Beatles concert from the mid sixties and in fact, after the concert they they follow you in the streets and they chant and things like that on your way to the hotel and they they re retain their distance, but they follow and they shout and they scream and it it's just quite incredible.

Presenter22:57

Yeah.

Peter Donohoe22:57

The whole thing, and it still goes on.

Presenter22:59

Your sixth record.

Peter Donohoe23:02

Well, I would like to introduce this in detail because it's a very significant piece for me in many ways, because it formed part of my introduction to the music of the twentieth century when I was quite young.

Peter Donohoe23:14

And I have to some extent promoted the music of the twentieth century rather more than most pianists do.

Peter Donohoe23:20

And it's the Tarangolida Symphony by Mession. And Mession's possibly the greatest living composer. That's a very debatable point I know, but he's certainly one of the greatest. And his wife was my tea my piano teacher in Paris for a year after the um after I I finished at the college in Manchester.

Peter Donohoe23:39

And so I met Messian and worked with him in great detail. And in addition to that, I saw the piece performed at the Proms in the sixties, uh and I'd never heard of it, or even of the composer at that time, and I was absolutely blown over by the piece, and it's always been

Peter Donohoe23:56

a very significant piece to me in in so many ways. And I recorded it, so I'm afraid again it's me, um, in I think nineteen eighty six, and it's the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra conducted by Simon Rattle.

Peter Donohoe25:10

If you'd listened to that very, very carefully, you would have h heard us a trill on a Celeste, which was actually my wife. We also have a a daughter, by the way, who's, I think, showing signs of quite remarkable musicianship.

Speaker 225:17

Uh

Presenter25:22

I bet. Anyway, that was Messian's Touring Galilea symphony, played by the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Simon Rattle, the pianist Peter Donahoe, the Celeste player misses Donahoe.

Presenter25:34

I read, Peter, that uh you were involved in a in a seventy mile an hour car crash some years ago, and as you headed for impact you put your hands, your precious hands, under your arms armpits, is that right?

Peter Donohoe25:44

You are

Peter Donohoe25:45

Yes, that's right. Whether or not we were travelling at seventy miles an hour at the time is perhaps slightly dev debatable. Uh but uh yes, uh for a variety of reasons we spun off the road.

Peter Donohoe25:55

Uh and um

Peter Donohoe25:56

I think that uh had I not hidden my hands under my arms, uh that um we would have been crushed between two lorries.

Presenter26:05

But it's interesting that your first thought was for your hands in that way.

Peter Donohoe26:07

Well I'd heard that another pianist had done exactly the same thing at some point in my life and uh I always said to myself that that's what I would do.

Peter Donohoe26:16

And it really did save save our lives.

Presenter26:19

Tao.

Peter Donohoe26:20

Well, simply because we ran off the road instead of remaining on it, where all these lorries were were out of control as well.

Peter Donohoe26:27

And uh and so we we missed the the impact that we were supposedly destined for.

Presenter26:33

So your hands obviously are heavily insured.

Peter Donohoe26:37

Mm. Well actually they could be, but they're not. I o they ought to be. You're quite right. Thank you for reminding me.

Peter Donohoe26:45

No, they're not.

Presenter26:46

Good.

Peter Donohoe26:46

Yeah.

Speaker 226:47

Uh

Peter Donohoe26:47

It's remarkably difficult to persuade an insurance company, as a matter of fact. The first thing they'd they'd say is um

Peter Donohoe26:53

Uh how many hours a day are you at risk? By which they mean that your hands are at their most risk during your work.

Peter Donohoe27:01

Which of course is a total misunderstanding of the problem. It's when you're not working that when you're putting a curtain rail up or

Peter Donohoe27:07

Or driving a car, that's when the real problem is, and of course they're not interested in that.

Presenter27:10

Well, I wanted to ask you about all that. I mean, are you going to be are you a do-it-yourselfer? Uh, are you going to be any good on the island? Can you build a shelter?

Peter Donohoe27:18

I think I could, yes, if I took it slowly.

Presenter27:21

So you do wield a hammer despite the fact you might hit yourself on the thumb.

Peter Donohoe27:24

Yes, yes I do. I've nearly sliced one finger off before now, and I've also drilled into the palm of my hand. Just a day before a Wigmore Hall concert, actually. But I still did it.

Presenter27:33

Yeah.

Peter Donohoe27:33

Um but yes, I I think I would have a go.

Presenter27:34

Uh

Presenter27:37

And will you, Peter, on the island, be lost without an audience?

Peter Donohoe27:42

It's difficult to say. I d no, I don't think so. No. I think I think in in the situation that I found myself I would accept my limitations and I would be very happy to get away from them in some ways.

Peter Donohoe27:54

It's obviously a total change. It's almost the antithesis of what I do, of course. So, uh in many ways it would be very attractive.

Presenter28:02

Your seventh record, please.

Peter Donohoe28:04

I just had to have a piece by Brahms because I think that of all the composers um he's one of the most indispensable.

Peter Donohoe28:12

And I nearly chose a piano concerto, but I think we've had enough of those. And so this is the second movement of the Brahms Third Symphony.

Presenter29:18

Part of the second movement of Brahm's third symphony, Bruno Walter conducting the Columbia Symphony Orchestra.

Presenter29:25

Peter, how long is the career of a concert pianist you go on to be dropped?

Peter Donohoe29:30

Yes, I think you can

Peter Donohoe29:32

I think you can probably maintain

Peter Donohoe29:34

This because the the amount of stress that's involved, which is huge on the stage, is immediately dissipated at the end of a concert. And I think also that although I don't display much sign of it physically, it keeps you quite fit. Um there there are parts of the body that uh tend to get bigger and bigger of course, uh but I th the bit that matters, the the breathing system and everything is constantly given a kind of aerobic treatment in performance, and you remain very healthy.

Peter Donohoe30:00

And as long as your your mind

Peter Donohoe30:03

retains its youthfulness. I think I think it you can go on until

Peter Donohoe30:07

Until a very late stage. M my ambition is actually to continue doing what I'm doing and perhaps to to um

Peter Donohoe30:16

to limit the number of concerts a little bit more than I have so far.

Presenter30:20

How many do you do a year?

Peter Donohoe30:21

This year, I think it's a hundred and forty.

Peter Donohoe30:24

Um which is a little bit too many.

Peter Donohoe30:27

In the season eighty two three I did two hundred and forty, which is just completely r ludicrous. And uh obviously that that completely devastates one's domestic life and and actually even interferes with the amount of practice you do. And so I'd I'd like to tone it down a little bit.

Peter Donohoe30:45

I think eighty would be a good a good number.

Presenter30:47

And um what single piece of advice would you hand down to the aspiring concert pianist, I wonder?

Peter Donohoe30:56

Well, I think um

Peter Donohoe30:59

I think the most important thing is not to specialise too early, not to be snobbish about different aspects of music, in other words, to play chamber music.

Peter Donohoe31:09

And if you can, if you have a another instrument, to play in orchestras as much as you can, and to work with people and not in a practice room, as much as you possibly can as well.

Peter Donohoe31:18

To keep your feet on the ground.

Peter Donohoe31:20

Um if you're going to not believe the bad reviews, do not believe the good ones either.

Peter Donohoe31:26

And generally to try and sublimate the the unfortunate part of the ego, which can so easily get in the way. But of course.

Peter Donohoe31:36

There is another side of the ego which is very important, because without it you can't go out at all and play.

Peter Donohoe31:41

It's a very fine line, it's it's it's uh a series of very happy coincidences if you can do this.

Peter Donohoe31:48

Uh a lot of different coincidences and I I think I'm extremely lucky with most of them.

Presenter31:53

Let's have your eighth record.

Peter Donohoe31:55

I needed to have a piece of chamber music, and I suspect that this piece has been chosen by many other castaways as well, because it is one of the greatest pieces of chamber music ever written Schubert's String Quintet in C major.

Presenter33:11

Schubert's string quintet in C major played by the Amadeus Quartet with Robert Cohen.

Presenter33:16

So, Peter Donahoe, you're one record. How are you going to choose one of those?

Peter Donohoe33:23

Well, of course, as a performer one spends one's whole time trying to work out whether

Peter Donohoe33:29

Uh one's enthusiasm for a piece of music is

Peter Donohoe33:33

Permanent or otherwise.

Peter Donohoe33:35

And I don't know whether it's coincidence, but it's always the chamber music which is the longest lasting. Possibly because it's the

Peter Donohoe33:42

the one that doesn't immediately grab you when you when you first hear it. I think that's probably universally true because it's the least theatrical um

Peter Donohoe33:51

mode of music making. And so I'm going to go for the Schubert.

Presenter33:55

And your book, you've got the complete works of Shakespeare, and you've got the Bible. You can have another one. What would you like?

Peter Donohoe34:01

So I need something to make me laugh, and so I would l I would rather like to go for the complete um scripts of Billy Connolly.

Presenter34:09

Has he bound them all together?

Peter Donohoe34:10

I wouldn't know, but I hope he does so by the by the time I'm stranded.

Presenter34:15

We'll bind them together for you anyway.

Peter Donohoe34:16

Blanket

Presenter34:17

And and your luxury, Peter.

Peter Donohoe34:19

Uh can I have something that's slightly practical? Uh something to sleep on? A water bed?

Presenter34:25

Well, why not? I mean, I it's not practical in that you could use it to escape or anything. You'll just rely on it.

Peter Donohoe34:29

I think it would sink, wouldn't it?

Presenter34:32

What if you tried to float away?

Peter Donohoe34:33

If it's full of water, it seems to me that it probably would.

Presenter34:34

It seems to me that it probably would.

Peter Donohoe34:35

Uh and and if I could sleep really well, I think that uh any problems that being on a desert island would present um me with, I I think I could cope with it. I've always found in my life that that you can do anything if you've slept enough.

Presenter34:50

You shall have it all. Peter Donahoe, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your desert island discs.

Speaker 235:03

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