Farmer, 75, who survived heart disease and complex surgery wins Britain’s Got Talent with Jeremy Clarkson’s choir

A Welsh farmer who survived a “shock” diagnosis that required triple bypass heart surgery and went on to win the 2026 edition of Britain’s Got Talent has urged fellow farmers who might be tempted to “hold back” on visiting the doctor to take care of their physical and mental health.

Hugh Thomas, 75, joined the Hawkstone Farmers’ Choir put together by former Top Gear star and Clarkson’s Farm presenter Jeremy Clarkson after a shock heart disease diagnosis left him in hospital and needing major heart surgery.

The 34-strong ensemble’s performance in the Britain’s Got Talent live final on Saturday May 30 received glowing praise from the judges, including Simon Cowell who described it as “absolutely stunning”, “heartfelt” and “joyous”. They will receive a £250,000 cash prize and the opportunity to perform at the annual Royal Variety Performance.

Hugh, who has run a sunflower farm in Pembrokeshire, Wales, with his wife Rachel since 1981, joined the choir in April 2025 after recovering from a heart disease diagnosis in February 2022, and hopes to use the platform to encourage other farmers to take care of their health and to see a doctor when they need to.

According to a North Yorkshire study by watchdog Healthwatch, 40% of surveyed farmers said that it is hard to arrange doctor’s appointments around their farming work, with a fifth saying they don’t like asking for help with their health.

Hugh admitted that he was of the same opinion.

“When it comes to health, farmers generally hold back and say: ‘Oh, it’s nothing, it’ll go in a day or so’. They tend to leave it, I admit I have,” he told PA Real Life.

“Most of the farmers that I know would put off going to the doctor unless their arm was hanging off,” agreed Hugh’s wife Rachel.

“’Oh, it’ll be fine in the morning, put a plaster on it’! There’s a lot of that in this industry.

“People are not keen to go to the doctors, and they leave it, and sometimes they leave it until it’s too late.”

In February 2022, Hugh, then aged 71, felt generally well but started to experience shortness of breath when he was exerting himself.

“I had a bit of an issue with Covid, it did me quite badly, and we all thought that it was down to that,” he explained.

Hugh’s doctors believed he was suffering from long Covid and advised him to monitor his symptoms, but Rachel “nagged” him to return to the doctor for further tests. Hugh was referred to his nearest hospital at Haverford West, and while there was “nothing particularly worrying at that point in time in the conversations”, Rachel said, he was referred to the Prince Philip Hospital in Llanelli for an angiogram.

The angiogram revealed some abnormalities in his arteries, and Hugh was sent to Morriston Hospital in Swansea for triple bypass surgery, diagnosing cardiovascular disease. According to the British Heart Foundation, cardiovascular disease includes conditions that narrow or block blood vessels (coronary heart disease) and can lead to a heart attack, angina and some strokes.

“Obviously that was quite a shock, I really didn’t expect that because I had no pain, just a little bit short of breath if I was doing heavy exercise,” Hugh said.

“We went up to Morriston, where (the doctor said) he expected me to come in in a wheelchair, because of the state of my arteries. I couldn’t understand it, because I was walking in perfectly normally.”

Rachel added: “The day that Hugh actually got diagnosed, the consultant said: ‘I will let you go home, but I will tell you that if you have a heart attack now, you won’t survive it’, which is quite a chilling comment, isn’t it?”

Three weeks later, Hugh had his triple bypass surgery – a type of surgery where ‘bypasses’ are created around narrowings or blockages in the arteries of the heart to help bring back blood supply to it, according to the British Heart Foundation – and was kept in intensive care for six days.

Due to Covid restrictions, Rachel couldn’t go in with him – plus, their farm is 65 miles away from the Swansea hospital, which made her feel “on edge” while she waited for news.

After a week in hospital, Hugh was able to return to the farm. He gradually recovered, tapering the “cocktail” of medication down and now only needing annual reviews to check on his heart health. He hopes that his story shows that a terrifying diagnosis shouldn’t stop anyone – even septuagenarian farmers – from living their lives to the fullest.

In April 2025, Hugh decided to answer a call for singing farmers, which turned out to be from Clarkson’s Farm presenter Jeremy Clarkson. Clarkson was looking to set up a choir of farmers to support them with their mental health, help build a cross-country community, and film some adverts to promote his line of beer.

Hugh had sung in choirs in the past, though not for many years, and decided to give it a go, completing a recorded audition for the Hawkstone Farmers’ Choir before being accepted out of over 500 applicants to the 34-strong ensemble.

“He did the audition tape down in the farmyard, because they wanted you in your working environment,” Rachel explained.

“He showed it to me afterwards, and I said, ‘Well, you could have tidied yourself up!’ The pocket was hanging off his coat. You can imagine what it was like. Very authentic!”

Hugh travelled to the Cotswolds for practice and to record some advertisements for Clarkson’s Hawkstone beer line, which famously “wouldn’t be accepted for television because they were a little bit blue, as it were”, he said. Shortly afterwards, the choir learned that the Britain’s Got Talent team had seen their films and asked if they would like to audition for the annual televised talent competition.

The choir excelled in their first audition in October 2025, even receiving the coveted Golden Buzzer, and Hugh said that it’s “been a bit of a whirlwind since then”.

They climbed their way through the competition and reached the live final on Saturday May 30 before being crowned the winner, as Clarkson looked emotional and applauded as they performed their original song.

After their win was announced, one of the choir’s members, Katryna Shell, told presenters Ant McPartlin and Declan Donnelly: “We are the first ever choir to have won Britain’s Got Talent.

“This is for all the farmers out there, for anybody that’s struggling, it’s not a taboo subject, if you’re not OK, speak up.”

Rachel agreed with this sentiment, adding that the spotlight on the farmers’ choir helps in “highlighting the loneliness and the isolation of farming, and the mental health issues that come with it”.

As for what’s next for Hugh and the Hawkstone Farmers’ Choir, the farmer-turned-singer remained coy.

“We had this amazing experience that weekend, obviously, and the choir has bonded really well,” he said.

“We don’t really know what’s in the pipeline, but I think there’s a lot of exciting things going to happen now.”

Every three minutes, someone in the UK dies from cardiovascular disease.​ To find out more about the British Heart Foundation and donate, visit bhf.org.uk​.