Lesley "Les" Welch (6 August 1925 – 1 September 2014) was an Australian musician, popular in the 1950s.

Career

Lesley Welch was born in England in

Newcastle-on-Tyne Newcastle upon Tyne ( RP: , ), or simply Newcastle, is a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England. The city is located on the River Tyne's northern bank and forms the largest part of the Tyneside built-up area. Newcastle is als ...

, but his family moved to Australia when he was young, and settled in

Gladesville, New South Wales Gladesville is a suburb in the Lower North Shore of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Gladesville is located 10 kilometres north-west of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of the City of Ry ...

. After teaching himself piano, Welch began playing blues in parties and at nightclubs during the 1940s. He toured nationally, performing jazz and appearing on radio, and in 1948 he was voted King of Swing at a Sydney Town Hall concert. He signed a lifetime contract with the

Australian Record Company CBS Records International was the international arm of the Columbia Records unit of Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc. (CBS) formed in 1961 and launched in 1962. Previously, Columbia Records had licensed other record companies to manufacture an ...

(ARC) in 1949, and by 1952 had already recorded over 200 songs for them. He left ARC to set up rival

Festival Records Festival Records (later known as Festival Mushroom Records) was an Australian recording and publishing company founded in Sydney, Australia, in 1952 and operated until 2005. Festival was a wholly owned subsidiary of News Limited from 1961 to ...

that year, and worked as A&R. In 1953 his album ''Tempos de Barrelhouse'', was released by Festival as one of the first records by an Australian artist pressed at 33 RPM. During the 1950s, Welch performed with his jazz band at concerts targeted towards a teenage audience, but that were popular with all ages. When he left Festival, Welch led the studio orchestra at Sydney's Channel 7, and later worked for

Reg Grundy Reginald Roy Grundy (4 August 1923 – 6 May 2016) was an Australian entrepreneur and media mogul, best known for his numerous television productions. He was the producer of various Australian game shows, such as '' Blankety Blanks'' (based on ...

producing game shows. Welch was later called "the Invisible Man of Australian music history" and "Australia's great anticipator of rock'n'roll" for his early work performing rock music in Australia. In 1950 he was described as "probably the biggest name in the Australian jazz field today." Les Welch died in September 2014, aged 89.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Welch, Les 2014 deaths 1925 births Australian musicians