[1] Known as The Singing Bobby, he became a local celebrity before starting to work the UK variety circuit, where he also played summer seasons in English seaside resorts.

[1] The renowned Irish tenor John McCormack advised him that his voice was better suited to a lighter repertoire than the operatic one he had in mind, and urged him to find an agent—thus he found the noted impresario Jack Hylton who booked him, but could not fit his full name on the bill, thus Joseph McLaughlin became Josef Locke.

He made his first radio broadcast in 1949, and subsequently appeared on television programmes such as Rooftop Rendezvous, Top of the Town, All-star Bill and The Frankie Howerd Show.

The song "Hör' mein Lied, Violetta" was often covered, including by Peter Alexander and was itself based on Giuseppe Verdi's La Traviata.

In 1958, after he had appeared in five Royal Variety Performances, and while he was still at the peak of his career, the British tax authorities began to make substantial demands that Locke declined to meet.

[2] On 22 March 2005, a bronze memorial to Locke was unveiled outside the City Hotel on Queen's Quay in Derry by Phil Coulter and John Hume.

A biography of the singer, entitled Josef Locke: The People's Tenor, by Nuala McAllister Hart was published in March 2017, the centenary of his birth.