Eurovision Daily

Guy Mardel was born as Mardochée Elkoubi on 30 June 1944 in Oran, French Algeria. Mardel lived his first 15 years in Algeria before moving to France in 1959. He later enrolled in law school, while singing recreationally with a jazz band. He signed a contract with AZ Records in 1963 and released two singles before being chosen internally by channel ORTF in 1965 to represent France in that year's Eurovision Song Contest with the song 'N'avoue jamais' ('Never admit'). At the contest, held in Naples on 20 March, "N'avoue jamias" finished in third place of the 18 entries. He was unable to capitalise on his Eurovision success, despite releasing many singles until the 1980's. He now lives in Jerusalem.

Danish singer Gitte Hænning was born on 29 June 1946 in Århus, Denmark. She rose to fame as a child star in the 1950s. As a teenager, Gitte sang popular hits in German, English, Italian and Danish.  In 1973 she competed for Germany in the Eurovision Song Contest with the song "Junger Tag". Her success continued after famous duets with Rex Gildo as 'Gitte & Rex' in a number of popular films. Gitte made an attempt to represent Luxembourg in the Eurovision Song Contest in 1978 with the song "Rien qu'une femme" but she lost out to the group Baccara. In the 1960s she also starred in several music and drama movies and on TV in Germany, Denmark, and Sweden. She continued to be popular in Germany and Denmark even as American music increasingly dominated the airwaves in the 1970s. Through the ensuing decades her singles have still reached the German charts, but never with the same success she enjoyed in the 1960s. In the 1980s, she changed her image and

Estonian singer and music teacher Silvi Vrait passed away on this day in 2013, after she was hospitalized with a brain tumour. Born on 28 April 1951, she was 43 when she represented her country at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1994. Her song 'Nagu merelaine' was the first Estonian song on the Eurovision final stage, since Estonia's first attempt to enter in the Contest a year earlier stranded at the semi-final. It isn't the most successful Estonian song in the Eurovision history, since it ended up in 24th place, in a field of 25 contestants.

Alsou Ralifovna Abramova was born on 27 June 1983. At 5 years old Alsou asked her parents for a piano. She was then allowed to attend a private music school. After living in Moscow due to her father's business, she then moved to New York City and later to the UK where she entered a private architecture college. In 1998, at the wedding of her brother Marat, Alsou sat at the grand piano and sang 'I will always love you'. After this private performance her family began to persuade her to pursue a professional singing career. She competed in the Eurovision Song Contest 2000 in which she came in second place with the song 'Solo'. She continued to record music both in English and in Russian, which earned her lots of success. Alsou hosted the final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2009 held in Moscow.

This year, Norway was represented by Joakim With Steen, a.k.a. JOWST. The producer and songwriter was born on 26 June 1989 and was chosen to represent Norway after an impressive career as a teacher at the renowned Noroff Institute in Oslo. 'Grab the moment' is an unusual song for the Eurovision repertoire, with lots of modern influences and sound effects not often heard in Eurovision. It ended up on 10th place at the final, after successfully placing for that final a few days before.

Jacques Zegers was born on 25 June 1947 in Brussels (Belgium). He began singing in cabaret at the age of 16 and in his spare time would participate in song contests while pursuing a career as a journalist. He released two singles, 'La nuit' and 'Pour elle', in 1983. He was then asked to record 'LA en Olympie', the official Belgian song for the 1984 Summer Olympics. In 1984, his song 'Avanti la vie' was chosen to represent Belgium at the Eurovision Song Contest. He ended up in fifth place in a field of 19 contestants. After Eurovision, Zegers only released one more single, '1001 amis', and continued to pursue his journalistic career. He published a novel entitled Le nœud and several volumes of poetry.

Rodolfo Chikilicuatre is a Spanish comedic character played by David Fernández Ortiz (born 24 June 1970) and first introduced in the Spanish late night show Buenafuente as an improvisational act. Rodolfo was interviewed as the inventor of the vibrator-guitar. The character rose to fame after he was later presented by the show's host, Andreu Buenafuente, with a song called "Baila el Chiki-chiki" (Dance the Chiki-chiki), a parody of reggaeton music filled with jokes and political references, and the show's host decided to enter the song into the Spanish selection process for the Eurovision Song Contest 2008. Rodolfo landed Spain's best placement since Eurovision Song Contest 2004, ending up in sixteenth place tied with Albania.

Achinoam Nini was born on 23 June 1969 to a Yemenite Jewish family, and moved to New York City at the age of two. She returned to Israel 14 years later, completed her mandatory service in the army, before studying music at the Rimon School of Jazz and Contemporary Music in Ramat Hasharon. This is where she met her long-time partner and collaborator Gil Dor. They released their debut album in 1993, starting an international career that continues to this day. In 2009 she appeared on the Eurovision stage together with Arab-Israeli singer Mira Awad, perforrming 'There must be another way'. They qualified for the final and ended up in 16th place.

Twenty years ago today, Ted Gärdestad passed away at the age of 41. At the age of 15, his music career started with his debut single 'Hela världen runt' ('All over the world'). He quickly became Sweden's first teen idol. Abba's Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus produced Ted's debut album 'Undringar' ('Wonderings'), which was released on Polar Music in early 1972, with Agnetha Fältskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad providing backing vocals. All four members of ABBA continued to work with Gärdestad in throughout the 1970s. It's no wonder, perhaps, that he ended up performing on the Eurovision stage too. He represented Sweden at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1979. The song scored eight points and finished seventeenth out of nineteen participating entries, making it Sweden's then-second-lowest placing in the contest. The Swedish-language single became a Top 10 hit back home in Sweden and "Satellit" is regarded as one of Ted's

Maria Rosa Marco Poquet (born 21 June 21 1939) is better known by her stage name Salomé. She became part of Eurovision history by being one of the four winners of the 1969 edition of the Contest. 'Vivo cantando', written by Maria José Cerato and Aniano Alcalde shared the honours together with 'Boom Bang-a-bang' (Lulu for the UK), 'Un jour, un enfant' (Frida Boccara, France) and 'De troubadour' (Lenny Kuhr, The Netherlands). Salomé recorded 'Vivo cantando' in 8 languages (Spanish, Catalan, Basque, French, German, Italian, English and Serbo-Croatian).

Born in Paris on 20 June 1984, Amir Haddad emigrated to Israel with his parents. Amir was born with a hearing loss of 50% and only hears the left side. Nonetheless, he sang as a young child in the synagogue and in various social events. In 2014, he participated in ´The voice: la plus belle voix' in France and finished third in the final. In 2016 he was asked by the television station France 2 to represent France in the Eurovision Song Contest. His song, 'J'ai cherché', was written by Amir himself with Nazim Khaled and Johan Errami. The song finished 6th overall in the grand final with 257 points, France's best placing since 2002 and the country's highest-scoring entry in their contest history.

In 2014, Estonia was represented at the Eurovision Song Contest by Tanja Mihhailova-Saar. She was born in Kaliningrad (USSR) on 19 June 1983 and started singing at a very young age, participating in contests in Russia, Ukraine and Estonia. Together with Estonian singer Ly Lumiste she formed Nightlight Duo in 2001. When Lumiste became pregnant in 2004, the duo disbanded and Tanja created the band Jz Belle together with producer and composer Timo Vendt. Tanja competed in the Estonian national final for Eurovision in 2014 and won with the song 'Amazing'. When she participated in the semi-final, she failed to qualify for the final, finishing 12th with just 36 points. Her solo career continued nonetheless. In 2016 she married singer Mikk Saar.

In 2009, Montenegro was represented at the Eurovision Song Contest by a singer called Andrea. Born as Andrea Demirovi on 17 June 1985, she'd studied at the Cetinje Music Academy before breaking through at the Suncane Skale festival in 2002. She released her debut album 'Andrea' in 2006. She became the first female singer to represent Montenegro at the Contest and performed the song 'Just get out of my life'. It was the opening song in the first semi-final on 12 May, however it failed to win a place in the final.

Representing Spain at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1995 was a young singer named Anabel Conde. She was just 19 years old at the time, having been born on 16 June 1975. Her song 'Vuelve conmigo' made a big impression because of her vocal range and strength. She would even have won that year, if it wasn't for Norway's entry 'Nocturne' by Secret Garden, raking in 148 points against Anabel's 119. Anabel then retreated from the music business because of troubles with her record company. However, she did participate in the 2000 Spanish national final together with singer David Dominguez, singing 'Ni colores ni fronteras'. They finished fourth. Another bid in 2010 was even less successful: she sang 'Sin miedos' and finished eighth.

On 15 June 2006, Betty Curtis passed away at the age of 70 in a clinic in Lecco (Italy) after a long illness. Born in Milan (Italy) on 22 March 1936, she was discovered in 1957. Thanks to her wide vocal range and her style of singing she soon became very popular in Italy. In 1961, she won the San Remo festival with the song 'Al di la', which earned her the privilege of representing Italy in that year's Eurovision Song Contest. She ended up in fifth place in a field of 16 competitors.

Rambo Amadeus represented Montenegro during the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest. He appeared in the semi-final with the song 'Euro Neuro', which contained the lyric 'I've got no ambition for high position'. This was rewarded quickly: the song failed to qualify for the final. Meanwhile, he's had quite a career in music. Starting in 1988, he's released eleven studio albums and various live recordings. His side projects included writing a musical score for the 1927 movie Metropolis and column called 'Megacarska razmišljanja' ('Mega-Imperial Thoughts') for the daily tabloid Blic.

The Icelandic singer Selma Björnsdóttir, born on 13 June 1974, appeared in the Eurovision Song Contest twice: in 1999 and 2005. Her first attempt was the most successful: she narrowly missed out on winning this edition because of a curious voting by the penultimate country, Bosnia-Hercegovina. (Iceland was the last country to vote and couldn't help the situation much anymore). It's a shame, because 'All out of luck' was a much more memorable Eurovision song that that year's winner. In 2005, Selma returned with 'If I had your love'. She performed the song in the semi-final, but failed to qualify for the final. Ironically, all this meant that she's responsible for the best and worst placing for Iceland at the Contest. So, do you remember this song?

Ivo Linna was instantly famous in Europe thanks to the Eurovision Song Contest in 1996 when he represented Estonia together with Maarja-Liis Ilus, singing 'Kaelakee hääl', in the Estonian language. It was a curious couple because of their considerable age difference: Ivo was 46 years old, whereas Maarja-Liis was only 15. He is not an unknown singer in Estonia, having released several albums solo as well as with different Estonian rock acts like Apelsin and Rock Hotel. In 2000, the President of Estonia decorated Ivo Linna with a IV Class Order of the White Star.

Today in 1985, Dmitry Koldun was born in Minsk, Belarus. In 2004, he tried out in the RTR show Narodnyi Artist 2, but did not qualify to the main stage. This did not deter him from his musical interest and in 2004/5 he worked in the State Concert Orchestra of the Republic of Belarus headed by Mikhail Finberg and in the Grand-Prix studio headed by the composer Oleg Eliseenkov who is still Koldun’s business partner. In the same year Koldun took part in the concerts of the National Festival of Belarusian sons and poetry Molodechno-2005 and the Arts Festival Slavyansky Bazar in Vitebsk. In 2007, he was selected to represent Belarus at the Eurovision Song Contest. His song 'Work your magic' managed to finish high enough to qualify for the final, where he finished in sixth place in a field of 24 competitors.

Borislav Dugic "Bora" was born on 10 June 1949 in Ðurdevo, Serbia, Yugoslavia. Since a young age he played the flute and after high school he became the secretary of the cultural group 'Abraševic'. As he continued to become more popular due to his abilities playing the flute, Bora moved to Serbia's capital Belgrade where he joined the grand Folk Orchestra of RTV Belgrade. In 2004 he celebrated 35 years of artistic work, by a grand solo concert name The Play of Spirit at the Sava Centar in Belgrade. In 2008 he appeared at the 2008 Eurovision Song Contest alongside Jelena Tomaševic. Together they performed 'Oro', a song named after a folk dance. They finished sixth in a field of 25 competitors.

Lisa del Bo was born on 9 June 1961 in Mopertingen, Belgium. She represented her country during the 1996 Eurovision Song Contest with 'Liefde is een kaartspel' ('Love is like a cardgame'). The song ended up in 16th place in a field of 22 competitors. On the CD-single, released at the time, Lisa del Bo also recorded English, French and German versions of the song, in addition to the Dutch original. The song became part of a controversy after it was claimed that the 2001 Swedish Eurovision entry 'Listen To Your Heartbeat' was plagiarised from it. At first this was denied by the Swedish songwriters, one of whom was Thomas G:son, but after the Belgian songwriters and the author's organisation SABAM pressed for legal action, a cash settlement was agreed.

Katerina "Katy" Garbi was born on 8 June 1961. As a singer she is mainly popular in Greece and Cyprus, with some popularity in Turkey as well. Her career has spanned over 20 years and is marked by several multi-platinum releases. Garbi participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 1993 for Greece with the song 'Ellada, Hora Tou Fotos', taking ninth place.The CD-single was actually released all over Europe, making it the first Greek entry to achieve this. Do you like this blog? Please consider buying me a coffee so I can keep filling this blog in the small hours of the day. Your help is highly appreciated!

Sophie Carle was born on 7 June 1964. She appeared in various films. In 1984 she represented Luxembourg with '100% d'amour'. She ended up in 10th place in a field of 19 competitors. She was only the fourth native Luxembourgian to represent the country, after Camillo Felgen (1960 and 1962), Chris Baldo (1968) and Monique Melsen (1971). Also in 1984, she filmed one of her main roles in a feature film: the character of Veronique in the sentimental comedy 'À nous les garçons'.

Jürgen Marcus performed at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1976. Luxembourgian broadcaster RTL almost invariably chose their Eurovision entry by internal selection. However, in 1976, they organised a five-song final in which Marcus participated with 'Chansons pour ceux qui s'aiment' ('Songs for those who love each other'). He won the selection, so went forward to the 21st Eurovision Song Contest which was held on 3 April in The Hague. His song ended up in 14th place, out of 18 contestants. His success waned by the end of the Seventies. Following a last minor hit in 1981, plans and collaborations came to nothing and Marcus largely dropped from sight. He released four new albums between 2004 and 2011. In April 2017, Marcus declared the end of his career, citing a lung disease as the reason.

Colm Wilkinson represented Ireland with 'Born to sing' at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1978. This was one year after his self-titled debut album. The song was performed first on the night, and was a rather impressive display of vocal performance. Subsequently, Wilkinson became best known for originating the role of Jean Valjean in Les Misérables (in the West End and Broadway) and for taking the title role in The Phantom of the Opera at the Sydmonton Festival and in the original Canadian production. His versions of both "The Music of the Night" from Phantom and "Bring Him Home" from Les Misérables are acclaimed throughout the world; fans insist he perform them at all his concerts.

Bert Gustav Tommy Körberg was born on 4 July 1948. English-speaking audiences know him best for his role as Anatoly/"The Russian" in the musical Chess. He played the role on the 1984 concept album, and again on stage in the 1986 world première West End production in London. He has also performed the role several more times since then. Körberg has also played the lead role in many Swedish productions of other musicals. He represented Sweden at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1969 and 1988. In 1969 he came 9th with 'Judy min vän'. In 1988 he was less successful, ending up in 12th place with 'Stad i ljus'.

Monica Kristina Ingeborg Törnell, (born 3 June 1954 in Trönö, Hälsingland, Sweden) was discovered by Cornelis Vreeswijk in 1971. She was a prominent singer in several genres, mainly folk and rock music, for over two decades. Together with Lasse Holm, she represented Sweden in the Eurovision Song Contest 1986 in Bergen, Norway. 'E' de' det här du kallar kärlek?' ('Is this what you call love?') received a total of 78 points, placing 5th in a field of 20 competitors, continuing Sweden string of top 5 placings in the contest. Her participation in the Contest was not entirely uncontroversial, in view of her previous connection to the prog movement. She had, moreover, described the Swedish national final Melodifestivalen as "this damned pop competition" in 1977.

Together with Jan Dulles and Jaap Kwakman, Jaap de Witte formed 3JS, the band that competed in the Eurovision Song Contest in 2011. After considerable success in the Netherlands, the band was asked to play five songs in a national final. The song 'Je vecht nooit alleen' was chosen and re-recorded in English as 'Never alone'. Performing in the second semi-final, the band ended up in last place with just 13 points, which was even less than 18 points for the Polish singer Magdalena Tul, who ended up in last place during the first semi-final. Jaap de Witte quit 3JS in 2013. He was replaced by his son Jan de Witte.

Monica Anghel was born 1 June 1971 in Bucharest. In 1996, she took part in the international preselection for the Eurovision Song Contest. The Romanian song "Ruga pentru pacea lumii" was not chosen to go to the international final in Oslo. In the same year, she won the "Golden Stag" for Romania. Anghel participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2002 in Tallinn, together with Marcel Pavel. Their song "Tell me why" reached the 9th place, which was the third best score ever for Romania. A few years later Anghel started to collaborate with comic group Divertis.