1948 – 2025
In a heartfelt tribute to Humphrey Walwyn at his funeral in October, his son Tom asked a question: how can one encapsulate such an extraordinary life in a single eulogy? Co-written with his brother, George, he proceeded to deliver an in-depth and moving account of Humphrey’s life.
A contributor to the Marshwood Vale Magazine for twenty years, Humphrey Walwyn was born in London, the son of Rear Admiral James and Pamela Walwyn. His childhood was split between prep school, Winchester College, and his parents’ house in Malta, but he was happiest spending time with his grandmother in Wraxall near Dorchester.
Much of Humphrey’s life, as Tom explained, was driven by his rebellious nature and sometimes wrapped in myth. After a lively time spent at Winchester and threatened with naval college at Dartmouth, Humphrey rejected a life of service and ran away to Canada to become a teacher and then a DJ.
In 1968 he decided to join the Red Cross, via Save the Children. After just two weeks of training in Geneva, he found himself administering aid in Biafra during that terrible conflict. One extraordinary story from that time involves him being shot while fixing a flat tyre. He was only saved from death, he claimed, because the jubilant platoon commander had spent time at Oxford and decided to spare him.
Humphrey’s career was marked by a consistent love for music. In the late 1960s, he played in a rock band called the ‘Black Russians’ and although his main interests were Jimi Hendrix and Deep Purple he presented Night Ride on Radio 2, featuring hours of ‘easy listening.’ He later moved to Glasgow to serve as Head of Music and Light Entertainment for BBC Scotland and managed the BBC Scotland Concert Orchestra.
He was then drawn to the BBC World Service, broadcasting Western tunes to 50 million souls weekly. He travelled the world recording live radio shows of the Rolling Stones, Elton John’s first concerts in Moscow, and Led Zeppelin in Luxembourg. His favourite collaboration was with his lifelong friend Tommy Vance. Together, they broadcast rock music across the globe.
In the early 80s, he was asked to run BBC Records, the growing commercial arm of the BBC. During his tenure, many strange and unusual records entered the nation’s collection: thrilling Doctor Who episodes, the Miami Vice soundtrack, the best-selling Horror Sound Effects LP, and the renowned 1981 radio drama of The Lord of the Rings. Told it would never sell, he delivered 20 box sets to Harrods, which sold out immediately. He received gold discs for Aled Jones’ carols, Enya’s first album, and also for Nick Berry’s Every Loser Wins.
From there, he moved to mainstream pop acts as Executive Director of BMG/RCA/Arista Records and then Stylus Music. He moved to Beverly Hills in California, where he curated jazz albums, working with jazz label Mainstream Music and subsequently selling that business to Sony.
Since his time at the BBC, he had been working on a charity project, the establishment of the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts (L.I.P.A.) with Paul McCartney and Mark Featherstone-Witty. He then took a brief hiatus from music to run Linguaphone, shifting its business model from a suitcase of cassettes to an online platform.
As his career in record companies drew to a close he continued to play music, forming the Basement Band with friends to play pub gigs and parties.
Living in Burton Bradstock, Humphrey quickly won people over through his involvement in village life: local projects, performing as the hilarious yet terrifying panto dame ‘Molly Coddle,’ and his long-standing Marshwood Vale Magazine column of absurd observations, ‘Laterally Speaking.’
Tom and George remember their father as an ‘exceptional entertainer’ who loved games, cinema, practical jokes, silliness, and especially fishing. Whether casting for salmon on the River Shin, bone fishing in Mexico, or patiently searching for trout in the chalk streams of Hampshire, he was never happier than standing in the twilight and launching a fly across moving water.
Apart from 20 years of hilarious columns for this magazine, one of the joyful aspects of Humphrey, as described by Tom and George, was his determination that ‘the daunting prospect of adulthood’ did not have to be constricted by stuffiness and boredom. As Tom put it, ‘We had licence to be fun forever.’
In Humphrey Walwyn’s memory, we will be publishing a selection of his ‘Laterally Speaking’ columns over the coming months, beginning with his first column in February 2002 on the opposite page. To be sure not to miss articles, sign up for our monthly article alert by sending your email address to info@marshwoodvale.com
