Sheeba

Sheeba were an all-girl pop trio and were popular in Ireland and Japan in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Sheeba consisted of Maxi (who sang the Irish entry in 1973), Marion Fossett and Frances Campbell. They are best known for representing Ireland at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1981 with Horoscopes which came 5th.

In 1978 the group took part in the Irish national final with their song It's Amazing What Love Can Do which came 6th. They went on to release several singles in Ireland with producer Roberto Danova, although their biggest hit was Horoscopes in 1981, which reached No.3.

Following their exposure in the 1981 contest, they signed a recording contract in the UK and released the singles The Next Night and Mystery, neither of these found success however. The contest also led to concert tours in Europe and Japan. The following year they entered the Irish national final again with a song performed in Irish called Go Raibh Maith Agat (Thank You Very Much) which came 7th. Later in 1982 they were involved in a road accident in the West of Ireland that brought their career to an eventual halt due to their reluctance to continue touring. Shortly after the accident Sheeba represented The Netherlands at the World Popular Song Festival in Japan with the song Don't Know How which stranded in the semi-finals. After a Japanese tour in 1983, they decided to split, but did compete one more time in the National final in 1984, where they finished 4th with the song My Love And You. Today, Maxi is a successful broadcaster with RTÉ in Dublin, Marion Fossett is ring-mistress of the well-known family circus Fossetts, and Frances Campbell is a broadcaster in Northern Ireland.

Filippos Nikolaou

Filippos Nikolaou is a Greek singer who covered the Moroccan entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 1980.

Rajaton

Rajaton is a Finnish a cappella ensemble, founded in Helsinki in 1997. The Finnish word rajaton means boundless, to indicate the breadth of their repertoire, from sacred classical to near Europop. Rajaton consists of Soprano: Essi Wuorela, Soprano: Virpi Moskari, Alto: Soila Sariola, Tenor: Hannu Lepola, Baritone: Ahti Paunu and Bass: Jussi Chydenius. Rajaton performs primarily in Finland but also tours around Europe and the rest of the world. Rajaton appears regularly in Canada at the Festival 500 choral event in St. John's, Newfoundland as well as at MusicFest Vancouver in Vancouver, British Columbia, and was the guest artist at the Kaleid Choral Festival in Woodstock, Ontario in 2005, 2006 and 2010. Rajaton's fan following has grown substantially since 2002. In 2005, Rajaton album sales reached 100,000 worldwide. They have earned eight gold records in total, with Rajaton Sings ABBA reaching platinum (30,000) and Joulu reaching double platinum (60,000). Rajaton also includes original material in their repertoire: aside from works by composers such as Mia Makaroff, Laura Sippola and Anna-Mari Kähärä, some of their pieces are written or arranged by members of the ensemble. In one of the shows the group sings many Finnish Eurovision songs.

Merja Rantamäki

Merja Rantamäki (14-2-1957) is a Finnish pop singer. Merja's first hit was a Russian folk song in the late 70's. After that she had a couple of other hits in Finland. Merja was quite successful, performed in many discotheques's and theaters and made a couple of albums. In the early 80's Merja stopped her singing career and became a devoted housewife. In the early 90's she tried to make a comeback but stopped definitely after a short, unsuccessful, period. Merja covered quite a few Eurovision songs.

Jan Malmsjö

Jan Malmsjö is a Swedish singer, actor and musical star. he trained at the prestigious Dramatens Elevskola (The Royal Dramatic Theatre's acting school) during 1950-53 and one of his first parts at the national stage was as Paris in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. He played in lots of movies, musical and plays like Hamlet, Ibsen's Ghosts, My Fair Lady, La Cage Aux Folles, Victor/Victoria and he voiced Lumiere in the Swedish dub of Disney's Beauty and the Beast.

Jan Malmsjö is still as active as ever and could last be spotted on stage in the title role of John Gabriel Borkman by Henrik Ibsen at the Royal Dramatic Theatre.

In the 60's and 70's he made some quite successful records and he came 2nd in the Swedish national final for the Eurovision Song Contest in 1969 with the song Hej Clown.

In 1969 the Swedes picked the wrong song, in my opinion. After the voting there was a tie between Jan Malmsjö who sang Hey Clown, (which was written by Benny Andersson) and Tommy Körberg who sang Judy, Min Vän. They both got 31 points. The jurors had to vote again and they gave Jan 45 points and Tommy 54. So unfortunately Jan Malmsjö didn't go to Madrid to represent Sweden. Tommy Körberg came 9th with Judy, Min Vän.

Anita

Anita Spanner is an Austrian singer, best known for her participation in the 1984 Eurovision Song Contest.

Anita came to the Austrian national final in 1984 as a virtual unknown but her song Einfach Weg was the clear winner of 12 participants. In Austria the song was a big hit, it reached no 1 in the Austrian charts. In Luxembourg however Einfach Weg came last with only 5 points.

Anita released a couple of singles but could not repeat the success of Einfach Weg. In 1991 she participated again in the Austrian national final but came only 7th with the song Land In Sicht.

Anžej Dežan

 

Anžej Dežan (born June 17, 1987 in Šentjur is a Slovenian singer.

Anžej began his musical career by winning the TV show Karaoke only ten years old. His first major success though was in the 2005 talent show Spet Doma on RTV Slovenija, where he was the runner-up (beaten by Omar Naber, who got to represent Slovenia in Eurovision Song Contest 2005).

His growing potential was recognised by the successful composers and lyricists Urša and Matjaž Vlašič and Boštjan Grabnar, who became Anžej's creative team. Together with them, Anžej published his first single C'est la vie which was one of the top singles of several Slovenian radio playlists.

In February 2005, Anžej was a backing vocalist for Nuša Derenda at EMA, the Slovenian Eurovision preselection, while in May of the same year he entered the festival Melodije morja in sonca and cut his second single Vroče. The song received a great reception at the festival and the jury awarded him first place.

Anžej competed in the EMA 2006 with the song Plan B with 12 points awarded by the jury and 14 points awarded by the viewers. (The runner-up song performed by Saša Lendero was actually the one awarded the maximum points from the viewers but received no points from the jury.) As the winner, he got to represent Slovenia in the Eurovision Song Contest 2006 at which the song was sung in English and called Mr Nobody. It ended up in 16th place in the semi-final though, and thus failed to qualify to the final.

The song Plan B was also recorded in Serbian under the title Srce od Kristala. He claims that it's his own record.