An Xtra Happy Birthday, February 24th

Yesterday only gave us reason for a double Eurovision bithday celebration. Today doubles that however, and we’re having a quadruple one! It’s split down the middle, with two girls and two boys. Three of them were born in the early 1950s, while the fourth was born just as we entered the 80s. Although youngest, Stig Rästa is also the most successful at Eurovision! 

Monique Melsen, 67

Monique Melsen represented her homecountry Luxembourg at the 1971 Eurovision Song Contest in Dublin. She performed tha song “Pomme, pomme, pomme”, which among many fans has become a classic! Monique finished in 13th place out of 18 participating countries.

Caren Wood, 65

Caren represented the Netherlands at the 1990 Eurovision Song Contest in Zagreb. She did so as part of the duo Maywood, the other half of which was her sister Alice May. They performed the song “Ik wil alles met je delen”, finishing in 15th place.

Plastic Bertrand, 64

Plastic Bertrand represented Luxembourg at the 1987 Eurovision Song Contest in Brussels. He performed the song “Amour Amour”. He did however only finish in 21st place, beating only Turkey.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMqt27s0s5k

Stig Rästa, 38

Stig Rästa represented Estonia at the 2015 Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna. He performed this own song “Goodbye to Yesterday” alongside Elina Born. They finished in a fantastic third place in their semi-final, thus qualifying for the grand final. There they finished in a very respectable seventh place. Stig is a real Eurovision fan, having tried his luck in the Estonian pre-selections several times before finally going on to winning the ticket to Vienna. In 2016 he was one of the songwriters behind Jüri Pootsmann’s “Play”, and he is also returning to Eesti Laul again in 2018, trying his luck again with “Home“.

All of us here at escXtra wish today’s Eurovision birthday quartet the best of celebrations!