This week: a Eurovision winner, the gospel star known for Oh Happy Day, and the director of Police Academy
THE singer France Gall, who has died aged 70, was a French pop star who won the 1965 Eurovision Song Contest for Luxembourg when she was 17 years old with the song Poupee de cire, poupee de son (Wax Doll, Rag Doll), written by French composer Serge Gainsbourg. The British entry that year was I Belong by Kathy Kirby, which was edged into second place.
Gall, remembered for her distinctive blonde bob, was already a star in France when she appeared in the contest and went on to sell millions of albums over a career that lasted four decades.
The daughter of the lyricist Robert Gall, she won her first recording contract when she was just 15 years old and had her first hit in 1964.
French President Emmanuel Macron said of Gall that she had lasted through time thanks to her sincerity and generosity, leaving songs known to all French people. Culture Minister Francoise Nyssen praised her as a timeless icon of the French chanson.
THE gospel star Edwin Hawkins, who has died aged 74, was best known for the hit Oh Happy Day, and, along with Andrae Crouch, James Cleveland and a handful of others, was credited as a founder of modern gospel music.
An Oakland native and one of eight siblings, Hawkins was a composer, keyboardist, arranger and choir master. He had been performing with his family and in church groups since childhood and in his 20s helped form the Northern California State Youth Choir.
Their first album, Let Us Go Into The House of the Lord, was released in 1968 and was intended for local audiences. But radio stations in the San Francisco Bay Area began playing one of the album's tracks, Oh Happy Day, an 18th century hymn re-arranged by Hawkins.
The song, featuring the vocals of Dorothy Combs Morrison, was released as a single credited to the Edwin Hawkins Singers and became a million-seller in 1969, showing there was a large market for gospel songs and for inspirational music during the turbulent era of the late 1960s.
Beatle George Harrison later cited Oh Happy Day as inspiration for his hit My Sweet Lord, and Glen Campbell had a hit with his own version. Elvis Presley, Johnny Mathis and numerous others also recorded it.
Hawkins went on to make dozens of records and won four Grammys in all, including for the songs Every Man Wants to Be Free and Wonderful! In 2007, he was voted into the Christian Music Hall of Fame.
THE director and writer Hugh Wilson, who has died aged 74, was best known for the comedy Police Academy.
Wilson found work with Mary Tyler Moore Productions in the mid-1970s and was soon writing scripts for The Bob Newhart Show. In 1978 he created the sit-com WKRP, which drew upon Wilson's time working at a radio station in Atlanta.
He was also successful in movies, directing and co-writing Police Academy and later directing the hit The First Wives Club.
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