560/917 Gérard Lenorman: Chanteur de charme (France 1988)

The French entry from 1988 is one of those songs that at the time did nothing to me, but during the last 27 years has become one of my favourites. In 1988 I thought that Gérard Lenorman was a new inexperienced singer whose insecurity made his voice tremble and shake. His voice was far from the strong and straightforward singing voices of Lara Fabian and Céline Dion who took most of my attention that year.

When I received the VHS copiy of the 1988 contest in the early 1990's and got to hear the French entry again, my opinion changed. I also learned that Gérard Lenorman was an established star in his home country and his trembly voice was his trademark. His performance was also far from insecure. He controlled the stage and it felt like he was not singing to the camera but personally to me sitting by the tv.

The song itself, written by the crooner himself, is nothing special, but a well crafted love song made to honor the French ballad traditions, not much different from French eurovision ballads from the 1960's. The orchestral arrangement by the Eurovision veteran Guy Matteoni emballishes the song which on stage is bigger and more pompous than the rather sparsely arranged recorded version.

The studio version of the song is completely another story. On his album Heureux qui communiquent  and on single the song is over four minutes long. To make the song fit the three minutes maximum length the track was edited to leave out every other phrase rather than to edit out a verse or a refrain. So if you have only heard the Eurovision version of the song (available on the 1988 Eurovision compilation album), be prepared to surprises when you listen to the album version of the song. In either way Chanteur de charme is one of the better songs of the 1988 contest.

My points 4/5.

67/917 Jean-Paul Mauric: Printemps, avril carillonne (France 1961)

The French entries of the first Eurovision decade can be divided roughly in two categories: atmospheric ballads and cheery ditties sung with an artificially wide smile. After winning the contest 1960 with the latter style France tried to repeat the success with another happy go lucky song about spring and birds singing.

I don't have much to say about this song. Although Jean-Paul Mauric sung his entry Printemps, avril carillonne to the respectable 4th place in the final results, the song is nowhere as timeless and succesful as its predecessor, the winner of the 1960 contest.

The song has a catchy hook but you grow tired of it already at second or third listen. In the end of his exhaustingly cheery performance Jean-Paul is so exited himself that he is having trouble in singing the song in tune.

Despite of the relatively good placement Jean-Paul Mauric remained a small star, popular live performer but hardly seen in the record charts. Nine years after his Eurovision performance he died of a heart failure at only 37 years of age.

My points 2/5.

5/917 Mathé Altéry: Le temps perdu (France 1956)

As mentioned in my earlier article, during the last twenty years lots of new countries have introduced themselves in the Eurovision Song Contest presenting their first entry ever to the European ears. It is easy to forget that even the most established countries in this occasion also had their first song sung at some point in the mists of history. Even France.

France took part in the Eurovision Song Contest of course from the very beginning. The first French entry was the fifth song ever to be sung in this television series that next year celebrates its 60th episode. The honor was given to Mathé Altéry, a soprano that sung both chanson and classical music. Her entry leaned more to the classical side of her talent, a short ballad sung with the prominent accompaniment of piano, oboe and some nice strings.

The good arrangement of the song managed hardly to hide the fact that the composition had not much to talk about. It is not terrible but nothing really to remember it by. The operatic vocals by Altéry alienates the song further from its audience. Apparently no studio recording of this song was ever made and I can understand why.

But what did it matter, no final results (except for the winner) have ever been released from the 1956 contest, so both French entries (as all seven participating countries had two songs in the contest) shared the second place in the final results. I doubt that if the results had been revealed, this song would not have been in the upper half of the list.

My points 2/5.

113/917 Rachel: Le chant de Mallory (France 1964)

As I've told couple of times earlier, André Popp is one of my favourite songwriters ever to take part in the Eurovision Song Contest. And his entry in 1964, the 113th song ever to take part in the contest was one of his great entries.

Chant de Mallory is a very traditional French love song that there was abundance of during the first decade of the Eurovision Song Contest. Somehow the song written by the same team (Popp and the lyricist Pierre Cour) as the 1961 winner Tom Pillibi and the 1967 evergreen L'amour est bleu manages to rise above the others.

I find the song touching and the arrangement makes it go forward even when the melody repeats the same verse. The song's success (4th in the final results) is partly due to the faultless and sincere delivery of the singer Rachel (no video recording of the 1964 contest exists, but she can be seen singing the song here). I think that this song is an example of a conventional French eurovision ballad at its best.

Chant de Mallory became the biggest hit of Rachel's career. She did record some other singles during the 1960's but apparently her singing career did not carry her to the 1970's. Pity.

My points 4/5.

79/917 François Deguelt: Ce soir-là (Monaco 1960)

There are quite a few songwriters who have taken part in the Eurovision Song Contest several times during several decades. But there are only few composers who have done it with constant quality from the first song to the last. The composer of the Eurosong 79 is one of them, and one of my favourite Eurovision songwriters ever.

Hubert Giraud was already established songwriter before his participation to Eurovision Song Contest having written songs for films (f.eg. Sous le ciel de Paris made famous by Edith Piaf) and for the other major french artistst (Yves Montand and Dalida to name a few). Later his catalogue would include such a world hit as Mamy blue.

His Eurovision career started with a bang when his entry Dors mon amour won the contest in 1958 for France. He would participate in the international finals four years in a row when his songs represented France also in 1959 and Monaco in 1960 and 1961. Later his entries would be sung for France (1967 and 1979) and Luxembourg (1971). Each of his entries will get either 4 or 5 points from me should I stumble upon them in this blog later.

In 1960 the song Ce soir-là (with lyrics by Pierre Dorsey) was sung by 28 year old french singer François Deguelt. In the era of big French ballads, it was difficult to stand out of the rest, but this song (with a rhythm loosely based on Rumba) manages to do that. The song goes forward and is arranged perfectly. Although François Deguelt is not a very shining stage personality, he sings well and uses wisely the nyances of the song, from the quiet start to the loud ending. In 1960 this song got well deserved third place in the final results.

This song is not the best Hubert Giraud has done, but definately worth the promised four points.

My points 4/5.

858/917 Natasha St-Pier: Je n'ai que mon âme (France 2001)

Sometimes a small, tiny, almost unnoticable thing can make a firm favourite fall. Sometimes the expecations are so high that when the reality comes in, the disappointment is too hard to bare. This happened to my relation with the Eurosong 858.

Natasha St-Pier was to change the gloomy streak of French eurovision entries in 2001. The preceding five years had given the country only one top 5 song and the rest didn't even reach the top 15 in the final results. For France, one of the most succesful countries in the contest, this was disasterous and so an established canadien singer and succesful french songwriter were called to help.

Robert Goldman has written international hits for f.eg. Céline Dion, Florent Pagny and Patricia Kaas under the pseudonyme of Jean Kapler. The song he wrote for Natasha St-Pier was a well crafted ballad starting quietly and growing towards the end of the song. The arrangement is masterly and in the recorded version St-Pier is well up to the task. When I saw the preview video and heard the studio version of the song, I was sure this song was going to win. A sure five pointer from me.

In Copenhagen something changed, I don't know what. There is nothing really wrong in Natasha's performance, slight insecurity at some points and maybe a little tense presence on the stage, but that is only to be expected for a young singer on such a big stage. She sings well and manages to touch the audience enough to reach the fourth place in the final results.

Still, for me the magic of the studio version was gone. The song didn't gel like on record, and the small imperfections in the performance all but ruined the song for me. After high expectations I felt disappointed by the French entry and song fell from my favourite position to somewhere in the middle. To kill the song in my mind Natasha St-Pier decided to do what no other French representative had ever done before, sing the last verse in English for no apparent reason else than wanting to please as much audience as possible. Maybe it helped the song to gain more points, but this calculated change of language was the last straw.

Natasha St-Pier has continued her career succesfully for over 10 years in the francophone music business. Good for her, but her name reminds me for always of the disappointment of the 2001 Eurovision Song Contest.

My points 3/5.