July 5, 2023

Luxembourg is back The news came out two days ago: Luxembourg will have a national final. The national final will take place on January 27. Other news is that participants must hold Luxembourgish nationality or have resided in Luxembourg for at least three consecutive years or exhibit a strong cultural involvement and proven connection with the Luxembourgish music scene. With that news, Luxembourg is breaking with a tradition. In the past, Luxembourg chose it’s participants from other countries most of the time. And very seldomly the songs were chosen through a national final. Winners for, but not from Luxembourg No less than five times Luxembourg won the contest. But never ever anyone with the Luxembourgish nationality held the trophy. Jean-Claude Pascal (1961), France Gall (1965), Anne-Marie David (1973) and Corinne Hermes (1983) were from France. Vicky Leandros (1972) was from Greece, but lived and still lives in Germany. 1976 and 1978 About national finals in the sixties, nothing is known. It is said that in 1972, Vicky Leandros offered 9 songs to the Luxembourgish broadcaster. However, nothing about a televised final is known. It was German singer Jürgen Marcus who first won a Luxembourgish final, in 1976. He defeated among others Marianne Rosenberg. Two years later, Spanish duo Baccara won the national final. However, Danish Gitte Haenning and Belgian Liliane Saint Pierre were also involved. Gitte already took part for Germany before. Liliane was the Belgian contestant in 1987. Park Café and Marion Welter That was it for Luxembourgish national finals with plural contestants. However, the American/Luxembourgish group Park Café offered the audience three songs. 66,5% of the voters chose “Monsieur” as their entry. In 1992, Luxembourgish Marion Welter was supposed to sing the song “Iwerall doheem”. However, to give the selection an extra touch, the audience was able to make a choice between two songs. And of course, not “Iwerall doheem” but the other song “Sou fräi” won. Internal selections All of the other years, Luxembourg selected their song and artist internally. However, there are two songs we want to share with you. In 1979, Penny McLean, member of Silver Convention (esc 1977) submitted a song. The English version became a hit. Enjoy “Tut-ench-Amun”: Three years later, it was Marcha (esc 1987) who almost got the job. She was the lead singer of Babe, an all girl group. Their song “Boomerang” was released in English. Do you recognize Marcha?