Marty Whelan: The making of an Irish broadcasting icon

For almost half a century, Marty Whelan has been one of the most familiar voices in Irish broadcasting, a warm and unmistakable presence across radio and television.

There have been highs, setbacks, comebacks and more than a few reinventions along the way. Now, at 70 and still firmly on air, he is being inducted into the IMRO Radio Awards Hall of Fame, a fitting honour for one of the greats of Irish broadcasting.

The IMRO Radio Awards Hall of Fame honours individuals who have made a significant and lasting contribution to radio, across both on-air and behind-the-scenes roles.

Alongside Whelan, this year's inductees also include Michael Crawley - LMFM, Teena Gates - Bauer Media Ireland and Helen Ní Shé –-RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta.

So, where did Marty Whelan's broadcasting story begin?

Something in the Air

Long before the moustache became almost as recognisable as the man behind it, Whelan was selling insurance by day and moonlighting on Dublin's pirate airwaves by night.

Back then he was Marty Hall, finding his feet behind the microphone at Radio Dublin and The Big D.

Then, in 1979, came the call that changed everything. RTÉ was launching a brand-new station, Radio 2, and 23-year-old Whelan was in. He arrived alongside a new generation of presenters including Dave Fanning, Vincent Hanley and the late Gerry Ryan.

His first record on the station could hardly have been better named: Thunderclap Newman's Something in the Air. Nearly five decades later, it remains his favourite song.

Radio may have got there first, but television was not far behind.

There was Video File, quiz show Where in the World? and, memorably, Head 2 Toe, where Whelan became the fashion programme’s first male presenter.

And then came Eurovision.

In 1987, he co-presented Ireland's Eurosong final with Maxi. It was a good year to get involved: Johnny Logan won with Hold Me Now and went on to win Eurovision in Brussels.

Whelan also provided RTÉ's television commentary for the Eurovision final in Brussels that year.

Whelan and Maxi returned to host Eurosong in 1988, beginning a relationship with the contest that would eventually involve an awful lot of sequins, key changes and the occasional baffling voting decision.

But more on that later.

The gamble

By 1989, Whelan was well established at RTÉ. Then he did something few would have expected.

He left.

Whelan jumped ship for Century Radio, the ambitious new national commercial station. It was a proper roll of the dice. Two years later, Century was gone and Whelan was out of work.

Speaking to the RTÉ Guide years later, he described it as the "scariest time" of his career, recalling walks on Portmarnock beach as he wondered what came next and whether he had burned bridges along the way.

The road back was not straightforward.

Television, rather than radio, opened the door first. By the mid-1990s, Whelan was back on screen, presenting programmes including GFI: Go For It, Off the Record and Millionaire, before taking on the Saturday-night lottery show Fame and Fortune.

In 1997 came The Rose of Tralee, putting him right back at the heart of one of the biggest nights in the Irish television calendar.

Then came daytime television, where 12 to 1, PM Live and, from 1998, Open House with Mary Kennedy made him a fixture of Irish living rooms.

For a man who had once walked Portmarnock beach wondering if he had blown the whole thing, it was quite a comeback.

Euro Star

Sequins, key changes, questionable voting and Marty Whelan. For a quarter of a century, they have all been part of Ireland's Eurovision night.

Whelan returned to Eurovision in 2000, this time as its Irish commentator and has barely drawn breath since, taking Irish viewers through the triumphs, the disasters and the results that have occasionally left him sounding as baffled as everyone watching at home.

By 2024, he had clocked up 25 years behind the microphone, his mix of affection and mischief becoming almost as much a part of the night as the voting itself.

Yet, he has never sounded like a man reading from a Eurovision script. More like the person sitting beside you on the sofa who just happens to have the microphone.

Eurovision, though, was only one part of the second act.

Radio came calling again in 2005, when Whelan returned to 2FM breakfast more than 25 years after first joining the station.

Then there was Winning Streak, which made him a familiar Saturday night presence, latterly alongside Sinéad Kennedy. Even after the show disappeared from the schedules, people continued stopping him to ask when it was coming back.

And because radio, television and Eurovision were apparently not enough, Whelan found himself on a GAA sideline in 2008, winning the first series of Celebrity Bainisteoir.

Morning Glory

When Marty Whelan moved to RTÉ lyric fm in 2009, it looked, on paper at least, like a slightly unexpected fit.

He initially took over the Sunday afternoon slot from none other than Gay Byrne, before moving to weekday radio later that year.

Then, in 2010, came Marty in the Morning.

The breakfast show quickly became entirely his own: music, chat, warmth, the odd tangent and the sense that Whelan is talking to the listener rather than broadcasting at them.

More than 15 years later, it is still working. In May of this year, the programme reached a record 85,000 listeners.

Perhaps the surprise now is that the move ever seemed surprising.

Whelan is still setting the alarm for breakfast radio, still sounding delighted to be there and, crucially, never giving the impression that any of it has become routine.

Away from the studio, things have hardly gone quiet.

He recently sold out two shows at the Bord Gáis Energy Theatre with the RTÉ Concert Orchestra, a long way from those early nights on pirate radio but, in some ways, not all that different. There is still an audience, still a microphone and still Whelan in the middle of it all.

And these days there is another role he appears particularly taken with: grandad to his granddaughter, Lily Nora.

Nearly half a century after that first record played on Radio 2, Marty Whelan is still on air, still in good form and still sounding, reassuringly, exactly like Marty.