Ukulele Sensation by Mark Walsh

Today we were accorded a very, very entertaining talk by the multi-talented Mark Walsh who, believe it or not, started his stage career at the tender age of eight. Since then, he has worked alongside many of our most well-known stars including Danny la Rue and June Whitfield to name but two and yet he is still under forty!!.

It is very hard to categorise Mark as he straddles the varying genres of acting, speaking, singing, comedy and ukulele playing, the latter of which he is world renown for however, he’s also pretty good at all the others as we soon found out. He honed his skills whilst working under the exacting eye of Danny la Rue for ten years so he is an extremely accomplished stage performer and a consummate ‘ad liber’ but, not only were we privy to both these talents, we were serenaded as he sang a couple of very well known ‘music hall’ songs accompanied by either his ukulele or banjo ukulele.

After the demise of Danny la Rue, Mark’s career changed direction somewhat and he entered the world of radio. He is a regular guest performer on BBC Radio 2’s Friday Night is Music Night which is broadcast live from different theatres and concert halls throughout the UK and, in addition to this , he has swapped performing on the stage at the City Varieties Music Hall in Leeds for banging the gavel and now introduces the acts as its Chairman.

Although Mark was billed as a ‘Ukulele Sensation’, it was a delight to listen to his tales of the theatre which he told in such an engaging manner. These were interspersed with his ukulele prowess and we were invited to join in with some very old songs from years gone by – the words of which we can still remember after all the years. Mark is a relaxed and competent speaker and the epitome of a true all-round professional; Danny la Rue would be very proud.