Artist Profile - Mark Feehily, lead singers of the Irish boyband Westlife

Marcus Michael Patrick Verdon "Mark" Feehily (born 28 May 1980) is one of the lead singers of the Irish boyband Westlife.

Feehily was born in Sligo, Ireland, to Marie Verdon and Oliver Feehily. He has two younger brothers, Barry (born 1985) and Colin (born 1989).

Feehily rose to fame as one of the two lead singers of the boyband Westlife. He shares lead vocals with Shane Filan. Before Westlife, Feehily, Filan and Kian Egan came from the band IOYOU, which released the single "Together Girl Forever". Louis Walsh, the manager of the 1990s boy-band Boyzone, was contacted by Filan's mother and came to know about the group. The group was established on 3 July 1998 with the addition of two more members, Nicky Byrne and Brian McFadden. Boyzone singer Ronan Keating was brought in to co-manage the group with Walsh. Feehily has also co-written songs, some with the other band members.

Feehily has sung completely solo on songs for the band in some instances: a song the band wrote called "Imaginary Diva" of World of Our Own album and externally written "Talk Me Down" of Where We Are album and also "Before It's Too Late" of Gravity. At live performances, he also sang completely solo for the song "Silent Night".

Feehily has spoken to The Boston Globe of his embarrassment about Westlife's Rat Pack-tribute album, Allow Us to Be Frank, and blamed their label for forcing them to record it after Robbie Williams had success with this type of music, dismissing the instance a "a weird time" in Westlife's career.

In August 2005, Feehily publicly revealed that he is gay during an interview with the British tabloid The Sun. Feehily had recognized his sexual orientation when he was 14- or 15-years old. His family, band mates and close friends knew his sexual orientation. Westlife's manager Louis Walsh, however, was unaware of Feehily's sexual orientation when he began managing the group. As the only gay member in Westlife, Feehily kept his sexual orientation private and never had a boyfriend. Unlike his band mates, Feehily did not discuss his private life in interviews, although he had dated women prior to his coming out. In yet another interview, Feehily told The Sydney Morning Herald that despite the fact that the majority of Westlife's fans are female, there had really been no negative reaction.

During the interview with The Sun, Feehily also announced his romantic relationship with british fashion photographer [[Kevin McDaid The pair, who live together, had been dating since January 2005 after having met at a Cheerios Childline Concert in Ireland. Feehily said that while he did not intend on getting married right away, he was happy to know he could form a civil partnership in Britain with the recent passing of the Civil Partnership Act. In December 2007, Feehily and McDaid appeared on the cover of Attitude. After five years into their relationship, both were in engaged in February 2010, which was confirmed by Feehily himself via the social networking website Twitter. In 2011, Feehily discussed the couple's plans concerning having children together and discussed their marriage plans.

Feehily supports the charity group Aware. He was shortlisted in 2011 as one of the top 50 most influential gays in United Kingdom.