917 songs have been sung in the Eurovision Song Contest between 1956 and 2003. In this blog I go through these songs in a random order and tell you what I think of them. What song would you like me to review?
Nowadays it some times refreshing to hear a Eurovision song composed to the rhythm of a classic dance f.eg. waltz or tango. In the early decades of Eurovision this was more commonplace. The 55th eurosong was based on the rhythms of a latin dance bolero.
Wyn Hoop was only 23 years of age when he took part in the Eurovision Song Contest, that took place in London. His entry Bonne nuit ma chérie was a tender lullaby where the singer puts his love to sleep promising he will never forget or leave her.
To me everything is in place in this entry. The song is easy going, yet gentle song where the latin rhythms is used tastefully without clashing with the idea of a lullaby. The arrangement is superb and the young singer gives a confident and at the same time very relaxed performance on a stage.
This song continued Germany's good streak in the early years of Eurovision with 4th position in the final results and Wyn Hoop would continue to have a good career in the German showbusiness until the end of the 1970's. After retiring, he has written articles and books about sailing and travelling.
Portugal has always been one of the most interesting countries and their entries are eagaerly awaited every year even though the points awarded to the Portuguese entries have seldom correlated with their quality. However, it is obvious that sometimes the bad placing in the score board is justified even for Portugal.
In my opinion, the 1990's was exceptionally strong for Portugal with interesting and appealing entries almost every year. The 1990's awarded Portugal also their so far best result when fresh and fun O meu coração não tem cor sung by Lúcia Moniz climbed to the 6th position in 1996. Two years later my personal favourite, group Alma Lusa got to the respectable (but in my opinion too low) 12th place.
But the song between these two is to me one of the most forgettable Portuguese entries ever. Unfortunately for Portugal the juries (and the televoters who took part in five of the 25 participating countries) were unanimous: No-one was interested and, accordingly, no points at all were given to poor Célia Lawson. It was no confort to her, that the Norwegian singer Tor Endresen suffered the same fate and the last place was shared between Portugal and Norway.
I cannot blame either Ms Lawson or the Juries. She sang well (and was supported by weird backing speaking choir hiding behind dark glasses) and tried to give her all to the song. Juries also did their job well: The song was utterly uninteresting and even though there were even worse songs taking part, I can imagine that at the time of voting not many members of the juries remembered what the song was like.
The blame goes, therefore, to the composer. German born Thilo Krassman was the conductor, who conducted with the smile the portuguese entries in seventies and then again in the nineties. 1997 was the last time that the amiable veteran conducter took part in the Eurovision Song Contest and Antes do adeus was his only composition that took part in the international final. It is sad that he could not end his Eurovision career with a better song and better result.
