An Xtra Happy Birthday; Week 48!

November 27th

Today is the busiest Birthday party of the week. Are you ready for seven Eurovision Birthday People? Five gentlemen and two ladies.

Hans Kreuzmayr, 74

Hans represented Austria at the 1976 Eurovision Song Contest in The Hague. He dd so under his stage name Waterloo, as part of the duo Waterloo & Robinson. They performed the song “My little world”, finishing in a very respectable fifth place.

Vlado Janevski, 58

Vlado represented Macedonia in their first ever Eurovision, back in 1998. He won that year’s edition of Skopje Fest with the song “Ne Zori, Zoro”, thus winning the ticket to Birmingham. On the night of the final he finished 19th. As a result of this, Macedonia was not allowed to take part the year after.

Vili Resnik, 55

Vili represented Slovenia at the 1998 Eurovision Song Contest in Birmingham. He performed the ballad “Naj bogovi slišijo”.  He finished in 18th place, right ahead of Vlado Janevski (above), thereby just securing his country’s participation the next year.

Tinka Milinović, 45

Tinka represented Switzerland at the 2006 Eurovision Song Contest in Athens. She did so as part of the group Six4One. They performed the song “If We All Give a Little”. In the grand final they finished 16th out of 24 participating countries. Prior to this, Tinka had taken part in the national pre-selection in Bosnia and Herzegovina several times. Her most successful attempt was in 2005, when she tied for first place, performing Ralph Siegel’s “Sometimes I wish I Were a Child Again“. In 2002 she graced the Eurovision stage for the first time, when she was a backing singer for Maja Tatic in Tallinn.

Sanna Nielsen, 33

Sanna Nielsen represented Sweden at the 2014 Eurovision Song Contest in Copenhagen. She performed the song “Undo” in the first semi-final, finishing second, thus qualifying for the final. In the grand final she finished in third place, only beaten my Conchita Wurst and The Common Linnets. Participating in the Eurovision Song Contest has been a long standing dream for Sanna, and “Undo” was her seventh attempt at representing Sweden in the contest. Her best results prior to winning in 2014 was a second place in 2008 with “Empty Room” and a third place in 2001 with “I går, i dag“.

Max Jason Mai, 30

Max represented Slovakia at the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest in Baku. He performed his own song “Don’t Close Your Eyes” in the second semi-final. He finished 18th and last in his semi, thus failing to reach the grand final.

Josh Dubovie, 28

Josh represented the United Kingdom at the 2010 Eurovision Song Contest in Oslo. He performed Mike Stock, Pete Waterman and Steve Crosby’s song “That Sounds Good to Me”. Since United Kingdom is pre-qualified for the final, Josh didn’t have to take part in the semi. In the final, however, he finsihed dead last, having received only 10 points.

November 28th

Slightly less Eurovision Stars have a birthday today, still  respectable five. Do you have the schoolroom dance routine ready?

Lonnie Devantier, 46

Lonnie represented Denmark at the 1990 Eurovision Song Contest. She performed the fun up-tempo song “Hallo Hallo”. At the end of the eveninge, Denmark had received a total of 64 points, landing her in 8th place.

Daz Sampson, 44

Daz represented the United Kingdom at the 2006 Eurovision Song Contest in Athens. He sang “Teenage Life”, which viewers might remember more because of the performancethan for the song itself. Five female backing singers/dancers, dressed in school girls’ uniforms, were on stage with Daz. And the stage itself was set up as a classroom. When all the votes had been counted, Daz finished 19th out of 24 entries.

Magdi Ruzsa, 33

Magdi Ruzsa represented Hungary at the 2007 Eurovision Song Contest in Helsinki. She performed her own song “Unsubstantial Blues”. The song originally had Hungarian lyrics, “Aprócska Blues”, written by Magdi herself. However, she wanted the European audience to understand the meaning of the song. Therefore she hired Imre Mózsik to write English lyrics. In the semi-final Magdi finished second, thus sailing through to the grand final. There she finished in ninth place. She did however bring home a victory, as she recieved the Marcel Bezençon Award as best composer. The official video clip of the song also received a lot of positive feedback.

Jonas Flodager Rasmussen, 33

Denmark selected the singer Rasmussen to be their reprasentative at Eurovsion in 2018. He therefore performed the viking inspired song “Higher Ground” in Lisbon. The song was successful and placed 9th at the final.

Dominic Muhrer, 29

Dominic represented Austria at the 2015 Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna. He did so as part of the trio The Makemakes, performing their own song “I’m Yours”. Dominic, better known as Dodo, is the piano player and lead singer of the band. Since they represented their country on home ground, they were one of the pre-qualified finalists. In the grand final, however, they received the dreaded 0 points…thereby finishing in shared last place with Germany.