Luxembourg: Eurovision 1985 act Franck Olivier passes away

Luxembourg: Eurovision 1985 act Franck Olivier passes away
Monday, 08 November 2021

  • Franck Olivier, one of Luxembourg's Eurovision 1985 representatives with the song Children, Kinder, enfants” has passed away aged 73.

    Sad news for the Eurovision family, as one more of its past participants, Franck Olivier, for Luxembourg back in 1985 has died at the age of 73. He passed away due to health complications caused initially by a liver tumor.

    Franck Olivier (real name Claude Vangansbeck) was a Belgian singer/songwriter. He collaborated with Claude François in 1976 and 1977. He coverd the biggest successes of The Platters that he translated in French in 1980. He received a golden record in 1980 for “Souviens-toi d’Only You” and with “Tic tac” in 1982. He earned a gold record in Canada with his song “Amoureux de vous Madame”, with over 125,000 albums sold to date.

    In 1984 Franck began presenting the children’s TV show on RTL La Bande à GroboIn 1984 he sang the introduction song of the TV series “Albator 84”, as well as that of “Astro, le petit robot” in 1985.

    1985 was the year that he represented Luxembourg in the Eurovision Song Contest with “Children, Kinder, enfants”. Franck Oliver was the owner of Trans Euro Music, a record label he founded in 1986 in Saint-Sauveur, Quebec, his home since. He discovered Lara Fabian and composed some of the songs of her first album. In 1992 he published a book called “La Foi et l’Épreuve,” released in Europe in 2011, and sells more than 16,000 copies. His autobiography, “Ma vie, mo histoire”, was published in 2015.

     

    Franck and Eurovision

    Franck had made two attempts to reach the Eurovision stage for his home conuntry, Belgium,  before doing it in 1985 for Luxembourg. In 1978 he made his first attempt with the song “À qui parler d’amour”, he would try again in 1984 with “L’amour est fort” finishing 4th out of 10 acts.

    In 1985, Ralph Siegel got the idea of three duo’s from respectively France, Germany and the United Kingdom, to represent Luxembourg. However, the French duo contained a Dutch and a Belgian singer. The song “Children, Kinder, enfants” contained three different languages. 

    The entry ended with a small score of 37 points and a 13th place, something quite unusual for Luxembourg at the time.

     

     

     

    Nesws source: RTBF / Eurovisionuniverse

    Image: Youtube: Franck Olivier (" Qui fait pleurer les fontaines ")