Edward Kelsey

Edward Kelsey  was a British actor of stage and screen as well as a voiceover artist. He is perhaps best recognised as the voice of Joe Grundy on the long-running BBC radio soap opera The Archers - a role he took over in 1985.

He was born in Petersfield, Hampshire, and became involved in theatricals at school. He studied at local Churcher's College during the war, and then went on to study medicince at the University of London, but dropped out after a couple of years. During National Service with the Royal Air Force he continued with amateur dramatics which led him to win a place at the Royal Academy of Music where he studied speech and teaching drama.

Much of his early career was with the theatre, and then with a multitude of appearances in television programmes, which as well as his appearances in Doctor Who also included series such as The Avengers, Softly, Softly, The Saint, Public Eye,Dempsey & Makepeace, Z-Cars, Juliet Bravo, Casualty, The Wind in The Willows, The Vicar of Dibley and Tripods.

He voiced the characters of Colonel K and Baron Silas Greenback in Danger Mouse by Cosgrove Hall, and The Thing in Terry Pratchetts's Truckers.He also portrayed Mr Growbag in Aardman's Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were Rabbit.He can also be heard as the voice behind the descriptive commentary for the blind at the Palace of Westminster.

In 1992 he became an associate member in the Royal Academy of Music, where he had sat on the Examining Board for many years. He was also long-serving member of the audio commitee in Equity. He married Birgit Johansson in 1955, and they had three children, Christopher, Peter and Lisbet.