A crooner, he found popular success, especially in the United Kingdom where he had five successive Top 10 albums in the 1960s as well as several hits on the UK Singles Chart, including Val often talks about the great happiness of his childhood – his ‘Special Years’. However, his family were poor and he shared a room with his three brothers: his four sisters slept on the other side of a partition wall and his parents in the living room. When he was still young, one of his sisters contracted TB, forcing her to move into their parents’ room, and his father to move into a shed at the end of the garden. This eccentric arrangement continued until Val was fourteen, when his father died, but enabled him to spend a great deal of ‘quality time’ with his dad. His time with the Four Ramblers introduced Val to the joys of golf, honed his professional singing skills and arrangements, and led to the tour that was to revolutionise his life… A frequent performer at US air force bases, on one visit he found his appearance was advertised as the Val Doonican Show. Initially alarmed, he grew to enjoy this star billing. At the end of the 1950s, he wanted another change and joined a concert tour with Anthony Newley, opening in Manchester, where he met his future wife, the cabaret artist Lynnette Rae. They married in 1962 and had two daughters. It was on the Newley tour that his solo act emerged. At one cast party, everyone had to do a turn, and Doonican borrowed a Spanish guitar, perched on a stool and sang an Irish song. Newley asked him if he had ever considered something of the sort on radio or TV.

a b c d e f g h i j Dennis Barker, "Val Doonican: obituary", The Guardian, 2 July 2015. Retrieved 3 July 2015Doonican's 1965 song, "I'm Gonna Get There Somehow", has been used in adverts for Irish toy store Smyths. The same song was used in a Boots Christmas advert in 2023. Val continued to play cabaret and occasional theatre gigs but despite being a regular radio personality, no recording contracts were forthcoming for him. He was spotted at a concert by Val Parnell, who at that time arranged the acts for ‘Sunday Night at the London Palladium’, booked onto the show and performed an eight minute spot that, he says, changed his life. By the Monday, there were recording contracts and TV show offers flooding his manager’s office. Truly, as Val said many times, he was ‘an overnight success after seventeen years.’

a b c d e f g Kent, David (1993). Australian Chart Book 1970–1992 (illustrateded.). St Ives, N.S.W.: Australian Chart Book. p.93. ISBN 0-646-11917-6. Programming" (PDF). Broadcasting. 29 March 1971. p.76 . Retrieved 24 July 2014. [ permanent dead link] ( PDF)Behind the scenes, Doonican was described as "a perfectionist who knew his limitations but always aimed to be 'the best Val Doonican possible.'" [2] He was sometimes compared to American singer Perry Como, though he claimed his main influence was Bing Crosby. [19] He appeared in three Royal Variety Performances. [2] On 31 December 1976, Doonican performed his hit song "Walk Tall” on BBC One's A Jubilee of Music, celebrating British pop music for Queen Elizabeth II's impending Silver Jubilee. a b c "Val Doonican Biography". Valdoonican.com. Archived from the original on 7 February 2013 . Retrieved 5 February 2013.

The Val Doonican Show, his eponymous variety programme, featured his singing and a selection of guests, and it had a long and successful run on BBC Television from 1965 to 1986. Doonican won the Variety Club of Great Britain's BBC-TV Personality of the Year award three times. [1] Early life and career [ edit ]In 1963 he was booked to appear on Sunday Night at the Palladium, which led to him being offered his own show on BBC TV which ran for more than 20 years. He went on to have five hits in the top 10: Walk Tall, The Special Years, Elusive Butterfly, What Would I Be and If The Whole World Stopped Loving. a b c Heather Saul, "Val Doonican: Irish singer and entertainer dies aged 88", The Independent, 2 July 2015. At six, Val played in the school band, and later his brother John taught him to play the mandolin. Although his education at De La Salle college, Waterford, ended when his father died, and Val had to go to work in an orange box factory, he was sustained by his musical interests, by the determination of his older siblings and by a belief that life would hold more for him. Val Doonican Biography". Valdoonican.com. Archived from the original on 13 July 2015 . Retrieved 4 July 2015. The Bar-Stewards Sons Of Val Doonican at The Acoustic Festival of Britain". Acousticfestival.co.uk. 1 June 2014 . Retrieved 2 July 2015.

Doonican was born on 3 February 1927 in Waterford, Ireland, [1] the youngest of the eight children of Agnes (née Kavanagh) and John Doonican. He was from a musical family and played in his school band from the age of six. [2] He started performing in his home town, was featured on Irish radio and appeared in Waterford’s first-ever television broadcast. In 1951 he moved to England to join the Irish quartet The Four Ramblers, who toured and performed on BBC Radio. The group also supported the late Anthony Newley on tour, who persuaded Doonican to launch his solo career. He appears as himself in the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band's " The Intro and the Outro", saying "hello there" over the general hubbub. [27] In the late 1950s, Doonican became one of the artists managed by Eve Taylor, the self-described "Queen Bee" of show business, who remained his manager until her death. [10] Whilst on that particular tour, Anthony Newley held a birthday party. All the acts had to perform, but not in their usual roles. Thus, singers did impressions and comedy turns, with Lynn regaling the audience as an impressionist. The Four Ramblers did not have another ‘turn’ and Val stepped forward, guitar in hand, and perched on a stool and singing a couple of ballads and ‘Paddy McGinty’s Goat.’ At the end of his performance, Anthony Newley suggested that his solo spot was more commercially marketable than the Ramblers act and urged Val to ‘go solo’.

Seventeen Years To Become an overnight success

Martin Roach (ed.), The Virgin Book of British Hit Albums, Virgin Books, 2009, ISBN 9780753517000, p.94 Freedom of Waterford". Valdoonican.com. 17 June 2011. Archived from the original on 23 May 2015 . Retrieved 4 July 2015. In 1951, still touring Ireland with Bruce Clarke’s band, Val was approached by representatives of the Four Ramblers and invited to join them in England, where they are best remembered for ‘Riders of the Range’ on BBC Radio. They also presented Workers’ Playtime, their salaries augmented by gifts from the factories whence the broadcast was being made. Looking forward to his first free products, he found that his ‘Playtime’ debut was in a corset factory! It is not recorded whether he made use of the proffered samples on this occasion!!