The English Sides - Poland and Germany
Updated November 4th
In the next few weeks and months this page will change to give you the chance to meet again the stars of the 1997 contest.
Poland: Ale Jestem - Anna Maria Jopek
ANNA MARIA JOPEK, born in 1970, is a performer of wide-ranging talent, who won the F Chopin Society Scholarship in 1987, and was last year chosen as the jazz debut of the year by Polish Radio's Channel 3. Her work has been used in film, on record and on the Microsoft-Start 32 record, and she has performed in international and national concerts.
TOMASZ LEWANDOWSKI is co-author of eight plays, and has written TV and radio sound themes, music for documentaries and compositions and adaptations. He has produced four CDs, and is the composer of over 1,000 radio and TV commercials. He graduated from the Academy of Music in Warsaw in 1990, and won the National Instrurnental Competitions. He has performed solo around the world.
MAGDA CZAPINSKA graduated in psychology from the University of Warsaw. She is a journalist and writer, specialising in scripts and lyrics, who says: "My songs are created at the margins of life". Two of her songs were among 30 songs chosen by radio listeners as the greatest hits in the 70 years of Polish radio.
Download the English version 60 seconds MPEG-3 (450K)
"ALE JESTEM (But I am)"
Music: Tomasz Lewandowski
Lyrics: Magda Czapinska
My eyes open: the world comes into being
Above me - heaven, an orchard in front
Green apples' smell and taste
And all is so simple....
Anna Maria Jopek Biography:
Born 14 December 1970, graduated from the F. Chopin Academy of Music inWarsaw (1994), piano faculty, prof B. Kawalla class. She also studied philosophy at the Warsaw University (1996). In 1987-88 she gave a series of concerts as a holder of F. Chopin Society Scholarship. In summer 1989 she attended jazz workshops in the Manhattan School of Music in New York during her Scholarship at the Columbia University.
Artistic Career:
1984 - Piano debut at the National Philharmonic in Warsaw during a
series of concerts devoted to W.A. Mozart
Awards in 1996:
For the Personality of the Year-Top Production
Germany: Zeit - Bianca Shomburg
In 1996 BIANCA SHOMBURG became known to TV viewers in various European countries when she appeared in Linda de Mol's 'European Soundmix Show'. She sang herself into the hearts of millions of spectators and won first prize, performing the Celine Dion song 'Think Twice'. A member of a children's choir for ten years, she took singing lessons for a flirther number of years and toured with well-known soulband 'Good Old Boys' as their lead-singer, as well as being a member of the 'Glorious Glories' - gospel choir.
RALPH SIEGEL was brought up in a very musical family. Both his father and grandfather were composers, and his mother an operetta-singer. When he was fourteen Ralph began composing songs. His first musical stop-overs were Paris, Nashville and New York where he worked for several years. He has dedicated his life to music for more than thirty years - as a composer, lyricist and producer. Innumerable successes in the field of popular music have made him one of the most well-known personalities in Germany.
BERND MEINUNGER holds a masters degree in economics, but soon found this to be a rather boring profession - as far as he was concerned. Consequently he gave it up for a more interesting job writing lyrics! This decision was the beginning of a most successful career. His partnership with Ralph Siegel has made them one of the most ambitious and high-ranking writer teams in Germany.
Download the English version 60 seconds MPEG-3 (450K)
"ZEIT (Time)"
Music: Ralph Siegel
Lyrics: Bernd Meinunger
Sometimes time slipped through my fingers
and sometimes it seemed as though it would never pass
but time can heal many wounds and in many dark hour
I dreamt of turning time back - for