Couples that sing together stay together
We take a look at one of the area’s most successful husband-and-wife duos Russ and Sooz Donkin
RUSSELL was born in Scunthorpe and Suzanne in Wales and their love story started when, in their early 20s, they were both accepted by a local academy, which was ran, at the time, by the Hull City Council and local musician Johnny Pat. Russ said: “It was a very special time for the both of us and it taught us a lot about the business.
“We first started on the circuit with the trio Triple Exposure and were very fortunate to win a few awards and, starting out, it really helped our profile and got us noticed by more out-of-town agencies.
“We performed in venues across the UK for around ten years, including a spell on P&O ferries, supporting the likes of the Three Degrees, Joe Pasquale and Lisa Scott-lee from Steps.
“The line-up changed over time mainly due to changing situations and other commitments but singers Jenny Cain, Amanda Clarkson, Jenna Robert’s, Serena Hamadeh, Donna Mckinnon and Gemma Connell all contributed to its success.
“We had some really great times like the memorable nights we enjoyed headlining the Club Tropicana in Skegness”.
They gained a reputation for putting on high energy and professional shows and invested time and money on unique costumes and top-notch equipment.
The word soon got around that they were a very hard-working outfit and performances at many large-scale events soon followed including large corporate parties for Eurostar, multiple pride events and high-profile local events at the Hull City Hall.
Although they were playing music to suite their audience, Russ and Sooz’s musical influences are very different to the show they were performing. Predominantly into rock music, they decided to form the rock duo Exit.
“We chose Exit to ensure our name would always be up in lights wherever we went.
“Performing soft rock material we were thrilled to be awarded Best Duo at the prestigious 2002 Blackpool Command Awards.
They have both had successful ul solo careers with Russ receiving a
e Blackpool Command award after just one year, taking second place in the Hull Daily Mail Talent Trail i competition and performing on Viking FM’S Queens Gardens main stage at the Freedom Festival in front of 60,000 people supporting the likes of JLS, The Saturdays and Florence and the Machine.
He decided it was time to fulfil his s ambition of fronting a rock band, d, forming The Mr Men with his best st friend David Naylor on drums, David d Barton on keyboard, Mark Wood on n bass and guitarist Dave Herrick.
They proved very popular with h performances at Hull Pride and d tours of armed forces barracks ks across Germany.
Sooz and Russ formed a Meatloaf af tribute act called Dead Ringerz, perrforming sell-out shows across the country, including Tribute weekends and an appearance at Whitby’s Internation Halloween Goth weekend.
For a time Sooz’s change in career has seen her stage-manage Hull Pride for the past 13 years and also for York Pride for the past ten years.
From this, she was headhunted to stage-manage the London Pride main stage and in 2017 she was then asked to join the Hull City of Culture team and Back to Ours, Hull.
In 2006 her parents Harry and Jane bought the well-known local entertainment agency Newland’s Entertainment from its founder Stuart Adamson. Sooz said: “They always planned to eventually hand over the business and when my dad retired in 2012, we took over running the agency giving the business a bigger online profile with a top-notch website.
“Recent events have proved a serious challenge for everyone in the entertainment sector, firstly with the smoking ban and now the pandemic.
“The times have been hard, but despite the heartache we are poised to rebound as soon as we possibly can”.
Sooz decided it was time to help pass the baton to the next generation of entertainers. This led to the couple’s l ’ decision i i to t form f The Th St State t of the Arts Academy with Michael Stothard as Principal and Lee Roberts as artistic director.
“This is an ambition we have had throughout our lives and also inspired both of our children to becoming performers themselves.
“We aim to provide professional training in acting, singing, dancing and musical theatre. We run musical theatre classes for adults and children with special educational needs in collaboration with the charities Aim Higher and Downright Special.
“We have a Raise your Voice Choir for adults with cognitive challenges and we have won awards for some of f these th classe,s l like lik Th The L Lord d Mayor’s Special Civic Award for performing arts”.
Alongside this they provide exam opportunities in singing, dance and drama with students gaining scholarships and while the pandemic has been challenging, the school is fully open, providing much-needed and safe fun for the children and time off for the parents.
They are a hard-working and professional couple and while achieving all of this, they have 3 wonderful children who have also inherited the performing gene and they also found time to get married.