Biography
-
Born
17 November 1920
-
Born In
Tétange, Kayl, Canton of Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg, Luxembourg
-
Died
16 July 2005 (aged 84)
Camillo Jean Nicolas Felgen (17 November 1920 in Tétange – 16 July 2005 in Esch-sur-Alzette) was a Luxembourgian singer, lyricist, DJ, and television presenter.
Felgen started his career as a teacher. During the Second World War, Felgen was a translator for the German occupiers, and then a reporter with a French language newspaper. He studied theater and opera in Brussels and Liège; in 1946, he joined Radio Luxembourg as a chorus singer and a French language reporter. In 1949, the mastering of his baritone completed his theatre and opera studies. In 1951, he had his first international hit record, "Bonjour les amies" ("Hello Friends"). The song went on to become the theme song for his national broadcaster. In 1953, he recorded his first German language record, "Onkel Toms altes Boot" ("Uncle Tom's Old Boat"), in Berlin. He represented his home country in the Eurovision Song Contest 1960 with "So laang we's du do bast", becoming the first male contestant to represent Luxembourg and the first entrant to sing in Luxembourgish. He finished last with only one point.
One of the greatest hits of Felgen was "Ich hab Ehrfurcht vor schneeweißen Haaren" (“I Respect Your Grey Hair”), a cover of singer-guitarist and entrepreneur Bobbejaan Schoepen. Another was "Sag warum", in 1959, based on a melody by Phil Spector.
He also translated the two songs that The Beatles performed in German, "I Want to Hold Your Hand" and "She Loves You", in 1964. These translations were credited to "J. Nicolas", an alias taken from his middle names. Felgen, then working as a programme director at the RTL, was given just 24 hours to translate the lyrics, fly to Paris, and teach the band the versions phonetically.
Artist descriptions on Last.fm are editable by everyone. Feel free to contribute!
All user-contributed text on this page is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.
