Before the free language rule was re-introduced, when you were representing a country with a plethora of languages, it sometimes threw up some oddities. German speakers singing in Italian, Dutch speakers singing in French, English speakers singing in German.
Our friends in Switzerland were the masters of this art, and you were often playing a guessing game. Take today’s birthday girl Carole Vinci. She has an Italian name, with a first language that was allegedly German. So she turns up in Paris in 1978 singing in French. Any other country doing this would have you scratching your head. But not the good old Confederation in the heart of Europe. Carole finished equal ninth, so a middling position in a contest jam-packed with interesting songs, the biggest field ever at the time, and the orchestra in a revolving soup bowl. What’s not to like about all things Eurovision?
Carole is 72 today.
Bonne anniversaire/Frohe Geburtstag/Buon compleanno, Carole!