Famous Irish Tenors - Josef Locke

Because of his popular repertoire of operatic songs you could be forgiven for thinking Josef Locke came from Italy. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth and Joseph McLaughlin, to give him his real name, was born a world away from sunny Italy, in Creggan Terrace in Londonderry on March 23rd 1917.

As a choir boy, he sang regularly in his local church, in the Bogside area. Later, when a teenager, he added a couple of years to his age, so he could enlist in the Irish Guards. He saw service in Palestine before joining the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

Throughout he continued his love of singing and soon acquired the nickname of "The Singing Bobby". In the 1940s he began to sing on a professional basis and eventually did a number of summer seasons across the water in the popular seaside resort of Blackpool, England.

Around this time, Joseph was advised by that other great Irish tenor John Count McCormack to concentrate on the lighter ballads and get himself an agent. As a consequence Joseph McLaughlin met the famous British band leader Jack Hylton and was booked to play the prestigious Victoria Palace in London, England.

When he arrived, Joseph got a terrible shock, because he could not see his name on the billboard and thought Hylton had booked a replacement, having had second thoughts about this relatively unknown singer. In fact, Hylton had found Joseph McLaughlin was far too long a name to fit on the billboard in one line and - as he thought the British public could not get its tongue around McLaughlin anyway - he decided to shorten Joe's name to Locke. Even then, it would not fit on, so Joseph was shortened to Josef, which did the trick.

Thus, Josef Locke --the tenor that many people thought came from Italy and not Ireland -- was born.

And the reason they thought he came from Italy was because his first recorded hits, in 1947, were "Santa Lucia" and "Come Back To Sorrento". Later that year, he recorded the song forever linked to him: "Hear My Song, Violetta". That song title provided the title of that wonderful comedy movie starring Adrian Dunbar and Shirley Ann-Field -- "Hear My Song".

The plot of this movie centers around the episode when Josef, having made a dollar or two, decided the British tax vultures were asking far too much in the way of income tax and promptly legged it back the Emerald Isle, where he lived in peaceful obscurity in County Kildare, until his death on October 15 1999, aged 82. In the movie ( using a hefty measure of artistic license), Locke has never settled with the tax man and is still a wanted man in England. But Adrian Dunbar manages to persuade Locke to return to Britain for one last concert. Naturally, the authorities were soon hot on his trail, but Josef eventually manages to give them the slip once again.

The reality is a little more prosaic: Josef had long settled his differences with the British Inland Revenue and the release of the movie "Hear My Song", in 1992, reinvigorated his career. Not only did a compliation of his most famous songs get into the top ten album charts, he was also invited to perform at that year's Royal Variety Performance, where he met Princess Diana. In addition, he was a featured guest on the British tv show "This Is Your Life".

All in all, not a bad life for Joseph McLaughlin of Creggan Terrace, Derry.

Copyright 2006 Joseph Donegal and www.The-Best-Of-Ireland.com