For a tiny country with a relativly small
population, Malta has had a remarkable record at the Eurovision
Song Contest, coming second on two occasions, and being coming
close to victory in 1998, before finishing in third place. Last
year however things went badly wrong for the Maltese, when "I
Do" sung by Fabrizio Faniello gained just one point and ended
up in last place in the Eurovision final in Athens. Malta now has
to qualify for this year's final, and they've entrusted the task to
some of the island's most experienced songwriters and to its most
persistant singer.
The Maltese selection was staged over two
nights, with the winning song being chosen by the public on
February 3rd. In one of the biggest landslides of this year's
qualification shows almost 60% of the votes went to
"Vertigo" sung by Olivia Lewis.
Olivia Lewis was born on the October 18th 1978. At an early age,
she started showing interest in singing and performing and
eventually started attending singing lessons. This was followed by
a string of successful participations in local song festivals. Her
success was demonstrated in a huge collection of trophies.
Her first participation in the Maltese "Song for
Europe" festival was actually at the age of 14 as backing
vocalist. A year later she was also backing vocalist for William
Magnion's winning song "This Time", but she just missed
participating at Eurovision because of her young age.
Having started out by being influeced by soul music, Olivia was
later encouraged to start training for jazz singing. She was the
first Maltese singer to perform in the renowned Malta Jazz Festival
together with the Paul Giordmaina Jazz Quartet. However outside of
Malta she is famous as the "nearly girl" due to her
frequent attempts to get to perform at the Eurovision Song Contest.
She has competed at eleven consecutive times in the the Maltese
selection. In three consecutive Maltese finals between 2004 and
2006, Olivia finished in second place. In 2005, she came very close
to winning, despite a problem with the transmission meant that
several people didn't get to see her perform her entry "Deja
Vu". That was was written and composer by written by Philip
Vella and Gerard James Borg, the songwriters behind this year's
entry, "Vertigo".
Philip Vella is one of the most successful composers in Malta,
and winner of several music awards such as 'Best Composer' at
the Malta Music Awards, 'Best Sound Engineer', and 'Best Original
Score'. He has been involved in many major projects such as the
original song to mark Malta's entry in the European Union, the
Small Nations Games official song, and he also composed the
original score for the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting
held in Malta.
He has composed three previous Maltese Eurovision entries
"Desire" (2000), "7th Wonder" (2002) and
"On Again... Off Again" (2004) and finished in the Top 10
every time, coming close to winning the 2002 contest, when
"7th Wonder" came second in Tallinn. Away from Malta he
has written for many Eurovision national selections including
Belgium, the Netherlands and Bulgaria and he has seen several of
his compositions make it to the local charts, and has also worked
with artists from the Netherlands, Belgium, the United Kingdom,
Sweden and Ukraine. One of his songs also participated in the
Golden Stag festival in Romania, and won 3rd prize, and another 2nd
prize in the international Mega Hit festival in Turkey. Philipe is
also responsible for the soundtrack of many popular television
shows and soap operas and is the current composer of computer games
for the Black Pencil games company in Germany.
Gerard James Borg is regarded as a highly creative concept
creator and lyricist who amongst other projects, has co-written
three previous Eurovision entries with Philip Vella. In 2001 and
2005, he was also close again to victory in the Maltese selection
with two songs "Spellbound" and "Déjà Vu",
which placed 2nd in the national contest. "Spellbound"
went on to be voted 'Song Of The Decade', while "Déjà
Vu" sung by Olivia Lewis shot to number one in the local
charts.
Gerard has also written for several local and international
artists. In 2003, he penned the song "Heatwave", which
placed 4th in the 2003 Dutch Eurovision selection. He was also
invited by Norwegian broadcaster NRK in 2005 to write for the
Melodi Grand Prix - and together with Arve Furset he wrote
"Velvet Blue". In 2006, he co-wrote "Absolutely
Fabulous" for Queentastic, with Thomas G:son and Andreas
Rickstrand, which finished third, but became a favourite "one
that got away" for many Eurovision fans. Interestingly, Gerard
will be pitted against Thomas G:son in Helsinki, as the Swede has
been involved in writing the Norwegian and Spanish entries.
Also in 2006 he had three other songs in different national
finals across Europe, including "Beyond You" for Belgian
Vanessa Chinitor. This made Gerard the first lyricist to have four
songs in four different national finals in the same year!
Away from Eurovision, other projects Which Gerard James Borg has
worked on, outside the Eurovision sphere, include creating concepts
and lyrics for various singles and albums, and a solid
collaboration with some of Europe's top composers. His works which
range from pop to soul, to ballads, and rock have been appreciated
outside Malta, including the United States were Gerard has given an
interview to Billboard Magazine journalist Fred Bronson. Other
interviews include many leading websites, journals, television and
radio.
Olivia Lewis has re-recorded the "Vertigo" (you can
hear the new version above) and has visited several countries to
promote this year's Maltese entry and it is among the bookmakers'
favourites to qualify from this year's semi-final. The song has
also done quite well in many internet polls, regularly hitting the
Top 10.
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MALTA @ EUROVISION