Monday 21 January 2008

# 7 Toi, la musique et moi



Personally speaking, 1976 was quite a good year in Eurovision terms. No, I don't mean because the UK romped to victory with Brotherhood of Man's Save all your kisses for me. More, there were a number of smashing songs.

My favourite is, without doubt, Marie Christy singing Toi, la musique et moi. This song has gone through a rigorous test procedure this afternoon and come out good in all reports.

Quite apart from the conductor's smashing smoking jacket visible at the beginning of this clip, I'm especially excited to see the gracefully elegant Ms Christie shimmy effortlessly along to this shameless disco number. The high spot is, without doubt, the sight of Christie throwing back her head in advance of belting out the final note. Here's one performer clearly enjoying her job. As for hair? Stunning, absolutely stunning.

The backing singers have that 70s groove going whilst maintaining a stylish elegance too. Assuming the colours I'm seeing here aren't the result of faded TV, I especially like the two purple colours. Very nice.

Listen out for the bass player in the orchestra too. His is by far the most satisfying musical line I've heard during this Eurovision-research-thing I'm doing. And yes, that's quite a geeky thing to point out, musically speaking.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm not quite as big a fan of 1976 as you are, but I must say that it was a rarity in Eurovision history for me - not only did the juries get the top three songs correct, but they got them in the correct order too!

This is a great song from Monaco, very well performed and with a suitably chic orchestral arrangement. Possibly the only thing which counts against it for me is that very sudden ending. But apart from that, it's one of a surprisingly low number of uptempo Francophone entries over the years that have worked.

Anonymous said...

I've always enjoyed this song without quite knowing why, Jon your observations have helped me to understand now! I like the difference between the pacey rattling orchestration and the rather stately tune and performance.

You're right, she's clearly having a great time, knows she's going to do herself proud and whilst never going to win, she will have carved out a place in our hearts.