Inside double-act Aled Jones and Russell Watson’s 20-year friendship

Inside double-act Aled Jones and Russell Watson’s 20-year friendship

01/21/2020

What do you get when you cross The People’s Tenor with The Snowman? Heart-melting music by a couple of national treasures… boom boom!

The nation’s favourite classical singers and comedy double act Aled Jones and Russell Watson are back after working their arias off on a UK tour to promote their second album Back in Harmony.

Last year’s In Harmony became the best-selling classical album of the year and promises to be the gift that keeps on giving.

Or as The Voice Russell says: “By the time we get to record number 10, Not Another Bloody Harmony.

“We’ve known each other for 20 years – back when WhatsApp used to be something Bugs Bunny would say,” he adds in his deadpan Manchester accent.


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“We met at the Royal Albert Hall in 1999. Over the years, I feel like I’ve gained a mate. Trust in the music industry is rare, it’s a sh*tty business sometimes.”

Unsurprisingly for a man who has had two brain tumours, Russell’s funny-man routine is tinged with melancholy. But he’s found his kindred spirit in Aled.

“He’s loyal and hard working. I can talk to him about things I wouldn’t be able to talk to my family about. For the first time in my 20 years as a recording artist, I’ve got someone I can confide in.”


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Baritone Aled is feeling the love… and the heat as he takes his tie off in the cafe in the BBC TV studios in West London – as Russell chuckles: “He throws a lot of his ties into the audience!”

The TV and radio presenter, who topped the charts as a choirboy with Walking In The Air, is just as ­enthusiastic about the bromance.

He says: “We always get on very well. We’re very similar in that we love what we do, and we’re not really into the whole showbizzy thing.”


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And Aled reveals you get more than you bargained for with Russell: “He’s a ­brilliant mimic and only uses his own voice for five seconds a day – the rest of the time he’s Lily Savage, or Sid from the working men’s club or Michael Macintyre!”

Switching into a scouse accent, Russell admits: “The voices just come out of my mouth!”

Puffed up with fake outrage, Aled says: “When he does me on stage, I always sound like some,” he pauses to do a high-pitched babbling noise… “Tim Nice But Dim character.”


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Straight man Aled cheerfully acts as foil to Russell’s gentle mockery, but the respect they have for each other is real.

When not finishing each other’s sentences, they’re winding each other up, like when Russell jokes Aled sings The Snowman in the shower, and Aled ­sniggers that Russell listens to his album The Voice in his car.

“That’s not true,” grins Russell. “My musical tastes are dictated by my wife and my daughters!”

The Salford man, who used to be a bolt cutter, credits second wife Louise, 33, and daughters Rebecca, 25, and Hannah, 18, with giving him reason to live.


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It’s been a long way back since he had two operations for pituitary tumours and radiotherapy treatment in 2007.

Now living in Wilmslow, Cheshire, he married Louise in his favourite part of Spain in 2015. “Up past Marbella, near Ronda,” he says. Before Aled ­interrupts, “Rhonda Valley? and Russell laughs.

The child star from Bangor lives in Barnes, South West London, with his wife Claire Fossett, and actress daughter Emilia, 17, and 14-year-old son Lucas. The pair know more about each other than most couples since going on tour. While it wasn’t rock and roll, they managed to sink a few bottles of bubbly – mainly at Aled’s expense.


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“I bought three bottles of ­champagne in the hotel in Dublin. They cost a fortune, as I found out next morning,” he winces.

And there’s no wild nights throwing tellies out of hotel windows, as Russell points out the ­difficulty in getting a 52in plasma screen off the wall.

“That’s if the windows even open,” adds Aled.

While the People’s Tenor looks after his voice on tour, Aled enjoys a pint and the local specialities. “Aled will eat anything,” Russell says, preferring to amuse canteen staff with jokes. “They asked me, ‘Are you a vegetarian?’. No, I told them, I’m a Sagittarean.”


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Both chaps have just had birthdays, Russell turned 53 in November, while Aled was 49 a month later. Which is pleasing as nothing says Christmas like The Snowman. He glows: “Oh I love the whole thing, but Russell doesn’t like Christmas at all!”

“This is where me and Aled differ massively,” shrugs Russell. “I always feel reflective – especially on Christmas Day because there’s so much expectation to be happy. I just wish my gran was still here, you know.”

Then Aled chips in, “I look forward to when the grandkids are here.”


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Russell looks happier, “Me too.” At the other end of the table, his daughter Becky flashes a “don’t look at me” glare. Aled says: “Oops. Awks!” and the boys crack up.

Opposites attract and they go on a roll as they list their ­differences. “You drive too fast,” Aled says. “You don’t drive at all,” shoots back Russell. “Aled’s Mr Quarter to, and I’m Mr Quarter past,” he adds, referring to their time-keeping.

Although as Aled admits, he’s the one who almost missed a show when they were playing Proms in the Park in front of 60,000 people. “I was going round and round Hyde Park with a taxi driver who’d never been in London,” he recalls, “and my mother-in-law hyperventilating in the back. I got there as Michael Ball went, ‘Please welcome to the stage…’”

Russell rolls his eyes, saying: “I was all smart on stage and he was stood next to me in pumps, jeans and casual jacket. Twenty minutes later we came off thinking – did that just happen? Only the most important gig ever!”

Both men are trim and sport shiny white TV teeth, but Aled says he bust his knee playing five-a-side football with Jason Donovan, and says he couldn’t do 50 push-ups in one go. “No, more like in one year,” scoffs his mate.

While Russell says of his health: “This is why doing telly is a problem for me.

"If I’m being picked up at 6.45am, I have to wake up at 5am to start taking the drugs. I take hydrocortisone to kick-start the body.

“Someone asked if I’d do I’m A ­Celebrity, but lying in a jungle injecting steroids probably wouldn’t be…”

“…P eak-time viewing!” Aled offers.

Aled explains they’ll be going their separate ways: “We’re doing solo albums and I’m doing a cathedral tour.”

While Russell adds, “It’s my 20th anniversary tour. Ten years ago, I was told, ‘You won’t be able to work ­properly because of the drugs’. My response was, ‘F*** that’.”

Which makes his Songs of Praise presenter pal laugh, and add: “I can imagine us doing a tour again.”

“Oh yeah, no doubt about that,” says Russell, who adds poignantly, “We’ve enjoyed being together so much.”

*Back In Harmony is out on BMG.

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