Mal Pope

Mal Pope was born in Brynhyfryd, Swansea, Wales, into a family of teachers. He began learning to play the guitar aged seven and was soon writing songs.

In the early 1970s Pope sent a tape of songs to BBC Radio 1 presenter John Peel, who invited Pope to perform at the BBC. The session resulted in a recording contract with Elton John’s record label named The Rocket Record Company.

Whilst studying at Christ’s College, Cambridge, he spent much of his holidays recording in London. After leaving Cambridge, Pope moved to London and signed to Harvey Goldsmith’s management company AMP. He signed a record deal with Larry Page, wrote songs for Cliff Richard and The Hollies, duetted with Bonnie Tyler and Aled Jones, and toured with Art Garfunkel and Belinda Carlisle.

Pope hosted The Mal Pope Show, a late-night music chat show for HTV, in the 1990s, with the show winning a Welsh BAFTA award in 1995. He went on to host a late-night talk show on HTV called Heaven’s Sound, which won an award at the New York Film and Television Awards in 2001.

Mal also makes for an incredible guest, able to regale audiences with stories of Christmas parties and games of Subbuteo with Elton John, of how his sound has been influenced by the soulfulness of the Deep South, befriending the man who invited Dr. Martin Luther King to Memphis in 1968, and how he came to sing one of the most iconic TV themes of all time, ‘Fireman Sam’.