Long after he died his name was blackened, Albury historian Howard Jones says, in ill-informed "biographies" in Australia alleging he was a boozer, gambler and wastrel before he met his future wife Hazel Doyle, a petite pianist eight years his junior.

Jones says the true story is that McEachern served a long apprenticeship in his youth by touring Australian states with sopranos Nellie Melba and Marie Narelle and Albury-born contralto Ella Caspers.

Jones' latest book, Malcolm McEachern, Master of Song, is the first full-length life story of the great singer who had parallel careers as a serious concert singer and musical hall artist on radio, stage and early television.

"He was a grocer's lad leading a horse and cart around Albury until he was 22, but had already set his heart on singing in London's top concert halls," he said.

"Amazingly, between 1908 and 1914 he went on tours that took him to such diverse places as Cloncurry, Kalgoorlie, Gundagai and Yackandandah, as well as Sydney Town Hall."

After he married Hazel in 1916, they toured New Zealand and South Africa before arriving in New York as World War I ended.

At 35, McEachern was singing on stage between "talkie" films on Broadway but also gave concerts with Hazel accompanying him at Carnegie Hall and other venues.

Before he was 40 he was a sensation in London as a basso cantante, doubled as the jovial vaudeville act "Malcolm Neil", made gramophone records and began broadcasting on the infant BBC.

"All that was done by using his own deep bass voice because electronic microphone did not come into general use until about 1926," Jones said.

"By the time he was 50, he was a well-loved star in Britain and Ireland, having teamed with Englishman Bert Hilliam as a musical comedy act Flotsam and Jetsam.

"The Royal Family loved him, and so did millions hearing him on radio or records throughout the British Empire.

"Celebrities with whom he shared stage or studio ranged from Melba to Vera Lynn and from Harry Lauder to wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill.

"Amazingly he and Flotsam (Hilliam) were regulars on BBC Television from 1936 to 1939, 20 years before Australia had a TV service."

McEachern recorded something like 180 songs, many with Hilliam. Today his voice can be heard on YouTube, several websites and in record compilations.

His 1934 movie, Chu Chin Chow, is available online, too.

"His years in two world wars were marked by great service to charities and the Allied Forces," Jones said.

"He was unwittingly linked to the infamous 'Great Escape' of Allied prisoners of war in 1944; a Melbourne airman he had befriended being among 50 POWs murdered by Nazi soldiers in 1944."

McEachern, a heavy pipe smoker, sang and broadcast until a week or so before he died in 1945 from throat cancer, aged 61. Two months later his soldier son Bob died in battle in Europe.

Jones tracked McEachern's stellar career mostly through online newspapers in Australia, New Zealand, Britain and the US. The volume includes many photographs and lists 240 performers, family and friends.

The Albury and District Historical Society published the book, which is available for sale at the Albury Library Museum and Dymocks Albury or by contacting the society at PO Box 822, Albury, 2640.