Catching European dreams

You have to wonder. What ever happens to former Eurovision winners and participants? Most return to their country of origin and continue their careers as working songwriters and singers. Others fall back into the obscurity pit, and dust off their old photographs now and again for the benefit of their children's children. Some achieve success on a scale they never imagined. Enter Norway's entrant for Eurovision in 1995, Secret Garden.

A duo comprising Rolf Lovland (Norwegian top pop songwriter and Grammy award winner, a gymnast, likes soccer and disco) and Fionnuala Sherry (former RTE Concert Orchestra violinist, session player, avid historical novel reader), Secret Garden has slowly become a word-of-mouth sensation in the US, where the Billboard New Age chart records an impressive run of four years for the duo's various albums. So much for mediocre levels of success. Another Eurovision winner goes down the tubes, is how Sherry pertly describes the perception of Secret Garden. The twosome returns to Ireland five years after the Eurovision win (Nocturne - how could you have forgotten so quickly?) with a gig at Dublin's Olympia Theatre on June 1st. "We quietly went away and became very successful," Sherry says, in a curious accent that is closer to Norway than her native Naas. She says that success came not overnight, but through spending five years touring the world tirelessly.

"The difference between us and the Eurovision win was that we considered Nocturne as part of a volume of work. Our only condition on going into the Eurovision was that our album was ready - finished, mixed - and that if we won we were going out to promote an album and not just the Eurovision song from Eurovision winners. Our attitude proved to be the right one.

"From a media point of view, we had a story to tell, because it's very difficult talking about just one song that has been plucked from somewhere. That doesn't work. We promoted the album (Songs from a Secret Garden) in Europe, then worked on the follow up, White Stones. Exactly one year after Eurovision, America picked up on us. We released the first album and toured a lot there. Then Asia, Australia, New Zealand and South America came on board."

Ironically, the countries where they are most successful have never heard of Eurovision. Ireland has heard of Secret Garden but wouldn't touch Lovland and Sherry with a rose-scented barge pole.

"To reverse this shocking state of affairs, a new Secret Garden album has just been released. Dreamcatcher, compiled from the couple's previous three albums, is a melange of soft-focused, electronically-enhanced traditional music. Think a meditative mixture of Phil Coulter, Enya and Riverdance (minus Bill Whelan's in-built dynamism) and you're pretty much there.

Ask Sherry about Secret Garden's somnambulistic music and she talks about colours, chilling out and wanting to tell a story through her instrument. "If you can't do that, it's time to go home and do something else. I didn't feel I was communicating either through my input in a big orchestra or through my work as a session player. I enjoyed the work and the colleagues but there was no sense of self-expression."

Sherry doesn't believe that the success of Secret Garden had anything to do with what she calls "the Celtic thing", rather that it was a "destiny thing". Could the band have existed 10 years ago? "Record companies would have said forget it."

Brimming over with admiration for Bill Whelan's Riverdance score, she says that Secret Garden's music is timeless but not chart-driven. Songs from a Secret Garden, is still selling five years after release, says Sherry with some pride. The Secret Garden audience, she says, is not being catered for by MTV or radio pop stations.

"A programme director in the US who is controlling about 20-30 satellite radio stations is catering for a teeny pop market. But ours is late 20s upwards - people who are not into techno but who are not yet ready to enter a concert hall. They have very stressful jobs, make lots of money, and drive in heavy traffic. There's a need for music that creates a meaningful point in their lives, as well as a diversion to switch off stress. So many people have said to me that our music is used to wake up to, to go to sleep to, to make love to. It's used for weddings and funerals. Our music is bridging a gap, connecting with people."

She, justifiably, thinks it very strange that music she had a hand in creating would be used as a background soundtrack to people having sex, and visibly shivers at the thought. She and Lovland are not a romantic item, but "a brilliant partnership" (this said a tad forcefully). Ask Sherry about her ambitions and she replies, Miss World-like: "to be really successful, to travel and to play tunes that everyone would like". She has no five-year plan, just a desire to succeed. "You have to have a nut loose to be able to jump when you're asked."

While it's difficult to warm to Secret Garden's emollient, quasi-New Age music, Sherry herself is easier to like. She appears to have a sound commercial awareness that charges her batteries, and looks astutely upon record company antics with a cynicism that is quite healthy. A softness, however hides behind her tough cookie exterior.

"I'm very self-analytical, and very hard on myself," she says. "I don't give my head a break. Nothing is ever good enough. I need to learn how to chill out. Actually, I wish someone would make Secret Garden music for me."

Secret Garden plays Dublin's Olympia theatre on June 1st. Special guests Anuna. Dreamcatcher (Philips/Universal) is currently on release. Website: www.secretgarden.no