Radio 2 DJ Johnnie Walker has stated in a “very sad announcement” that he’s quitting each of his BBC music programmes due to ailing well being.
Walker, who has been a broadcaster for 58 years, will step down in the direction of the tip of this month from his Sunday afternoon present Sounds Of The 70s and The Rock Present on Friday nights.
The presenter has pulmonary fibrosis which suggests the lungs grow to be scarred and respiratory is more and more tough.
Talking earlier this yr, Walker stated his situation was “terminal” and getting “progressively worse”.
Picture:
Walker at Radio 2 in 2004. Pic: PA
In a message stay on air on Sunday throughout the Sounds Of The 70s, the 79-year-old star learn out a letter from a listener whose father had loved the present, however had died in 2022 as a result of identical situation.
The Birmingham-born host then informed his listeners: “Now, that leads me to be making a very sad announcement.
“The struggles I’ve had with doing the present and attempting to form of sustain an expert customary appropriate for Radio 2 has been getting increasingly tough… so I’ve needed to make the choice that I have to deliver my profession to an finish after 58 years.
“And so I’ll be doing my last Sounds Of The 70s on October 27, so I’ll make the last three shows as good as I possibly can.”
The broadcaster began his radio profession in 1966 at offshore pirate station Swinging Radio England, earlier than transferring to Radio Caroline, the place he hosted the night-time present.
When the station shut he joined BBC Radio 1 in 1969, persevering with till 1976, when he moved to San Francisco to file a weekly present which was broadcast on Radio Luxembourg.
He went again to the BBC within the early Nineteen Eighties the place he has remained ever since.
Walker’s final episode of The Rock Present will air on 25 October and his remaining episode of Sounds Of The 70s will air on 27 October.
He will likely be changed on the Sounds Of The 70s by Bob Harris.
And Shaun Keaveny will grow to be the brand new presenter of The Rock Present.
