Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

  This song is very dear to my heart for reasons I don't even know myself. All I know when I heard this for the first time on a Sanremo oldies sampler it was love at first hearing. Casa bianca was the runner up in 1968 festival and was performed by both Marisa Sannia and Ornella Vanoni.   I prefer Marisa's version for reasons unknown.

Loreen of Sweden is the 15th previous Eurovision song contest winner who has decided and/or managed give it another try. Only Ireland's Johnny Logan has managed to win twice, as we all know. One can't really do a ranking however as the contest had changed so much from the 1950's with maybe a dozen songs to the approx 40 we have these days. In coming days I will feature the winners who decided to come back  after  winning the contest as there also many winners who have won with their second or third try.   Isabelle Aubret (or Thérèse Coquerelle, 84) scored France's third win in 1962 with a classic love song Un premier amour. After Eurovision she was to do movie Les parapluies de Chérbourg, but   poor Isabelle was injured in a fatal car accident and had to pass. It's the classic that scored Oscar nominations among other things and made Catherine Deneuve. Who knows if only...  But in 1968 she was back after multiple operations and long rehabilitation. La sourc...

Italy took its well deserved third victory - finally! - at the Eurovision song contest 2021. Over the years several other Italian entries would have been worthy winners. In this series I will go through all of them from the worst ranking to the win ners. Sergio Endrigo (1933-2005) won Sanremo 1968 with Canzone per te (with Roberto Carlos ) but went to Eurovision with Marianne . He placed only 10th out of 17, but for example the runner up Cliff Richard made his own version of Marianne a bit later.  Endrigo surely left his mark in the Italian (and Latin America) music business with songs like Io che amo solo te and beforementioned Canzone per te and his songs are still today often covered by other big names. He did nine Sanremos, placing first, second and third among others, recorded 23 studio albums and countless compilations, over 70 singles and one soundtrack and starred in a couple of films. And talking about films, Luis Bacalov wins Oscar for Il Postino soundtrack and there's...

Isabelle Aubret was a regular in the French Eurovision song contest selections. She first took part in 1961 with Le gars n'importe óu finishing second. The year after she was back with Un premiere amour  , won and went on to win also Eurovision song contest 1962. The ex-gymnastic had a great star for her career and all was going fine and she had hits and was also offered the leading role in the film Les parapluies de Cherbourg (that then went to Catherine Deneuve) but a car accident ended that. She had several operations and it took awhile before she was able to come back to business.  She made her comeback in the French selection 1968 with La source and won again, and finished 3rd in Eurovision behind Massiel and Cliff Richard. The song was a very daring one at the tme, dealing with rape..... But she didn't stop there and tried to get back to contest a few times: Oliver, Olivia in 1970 (2nd), Je te conneis déjà (6th in semifinal) in 1976 and finally France,...

As an Eurovision fan travelling to a new Eurovision country is always also an adventure to the local record stores - if they only exist anymore. I was in Prague last week and they do have several stores left but....  not so much for a collector of this genre... The only Eurovision artists I saw were Kabát and Karel Gott. But then again, Kabát was all over the place; streets full of their tour ads and their CDs in every shop. The band's been together since 1983 and still seem to be the Czechia's finest and most popular rock band, filling stadiums and arenas. Their Mala dama deserved so much more in Helsinki 2007! Karel Gott is still very popular, at the tender age of 78, it seems. He has released dozens of albums since his Eurovision (for Austria) in 1968. He has already retired twice but seems to come back due to the popular demand again and again.   The Golden Voice of Prague joined forces with rock band No Name this summer for Kto dokáže for example..... and his ...

Kun kello käy or When clock ticks the years go by and Kristiina turns 69 today! She was born in Stockholm of Finnish parents and only came to Finland in mid 60's. She recorded singles between 1967-70, mainly covers, and represented Finland in 1968 Eurovision and thanks to that managed to release an album. However in 1972 she moved back to Stockholm and studied as psychologist and therapist. In 2003 she made one-off return to singing by releasing an album .  Congratulations!

Royal Albert Hall in London hosted the 13th Eurovision song contest on April 6, 1968. That year Eurovision was broadcasted in color for the very first time! Strangely there were no new countries debuting, no countries withdrawing nor returning.  Spanish Massiel ended winning with La la la . There have been talk about vote rigging ever since. Spanish dictator Franco would have bought votes all over Europe and thus finished above UK's own Cliff Richard by one vote. One should remember also that Massiel was not to sing the song originally but Joan Manuel Serrat . He insisted on singing it in Catalan, and was replaced by Franco's regime.  After winning Massiel released the song in four languages, and quite a few cover versions were made in other languages. She continued her career until mid 1990's and have done some occasional recordings even after her retirement announcement in 1996, like this remake of La la la As said, Cliff Richard came second with evergreen Congra...

Non so che? Non so che darei , one of the maybe forgotten Italian entries by Alan Sorrenti, anno 1980. The Olsen Brothers are celebrating the 10th anniversary of their win with Fly on the wings of love with a new album made of Eurovision covers titled Wings of Eurovision including of course their own updated to 2010. The other songs are Congratulations , Waterloo , Ein bisschen Frieden , Främling , Save all your kisses for me , Hallelujah , Boom bang a bang , Volare , La det swinge , Love shine a light and Rock'n roll kids . Some choices sound very suited for the gentleman, the others... well, we just have to wait til late May to hear how they manage with them!

First time in color, and the glitter was here to stay! Ladies had colorful dresses and Switzerland's Italian Gianni Mascolo wasn't any less: bright orange! 17 countries took part in London's Royal Albert Hall. The only previous participant was France's Isabelle Aubret while Cliff Richard was The Name. He didn't stand the pressure however and clocked himself in to men's room while the voting was on. And stayed there when it was clear he didn't win. Once again the last country to vote, Yogoslavia, was to determinate the winner. Or so we thought as they didn't give any votes to Spain or UK, so Germany's votes actually gave us the first ever Spanish winner. The song is considered the worst winner ever and was heavily critiziced afterwords for it's la la la nonsense.... http:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPwNyhsvhss