THE BELGIAN PRESELECTION 2004

PLACE: Studio 100 in Schelle PRESENTATION: Bart Peeters DATES: Sunday 18 January   2004 (1st selection) Sunday 25 Januray   2004 (2nd selection) Sunday   1 February 2004 (3rd selection) Sunday   8 February 2004 (4th selection)

PARTICIPANTS:

1. ROXANE - "Television game"
   (text & music: Danny Van Wauwe & Edmond's Jegers)

   Roxane Kalishoek is born on 5th of March 1979 and comes from Antwerpen.  Her first steps in the musicworld was as a member of 'Spirit".  Thanks to Mostiko/CNR she started her solo-career with her own version of "I wanna dance with somebody" by Whitney Houston.  Her typical styl of music is electropop with some influence of blues and soul.

2. BARBARA DEX & ALIDES - "One life"
   (text: Alides Hidding & Barbara Dex - music: Alides Hidding)

   Barbara Deckx is the daughter (born on the 22th of January 1974 in Turnhout) of Marc Dex. Since1968 he's a well know singer in Belgium. As Marc himself once came very close to the Eurovision Songcontest with his evergreen "O Clown", his daughter now won the national final leaving eleven well-know and more experienced artists behind her. The young singer, who until recently didn't dream of a professional singing career, grew up in the Flemish Campine together with her brother Tom and her sister Nathalie. Though being familiar with life in showbizz because of the success of her singing father, Barbara wanted to pursue a career in fashion designing.  In 1994 she starts singing in English with songs written by Alides Hidding.  Alides was teh leadsinger of the 'Time Bandits'.  In the eighties they conquered the popworld with lots of big hits.  In 1989 Alidus decide to stop with the group and moves to Los Angeles where he started to write songs for Jennifer Rush, Helen Schneider, etc...  At the moment whe works as a songwriter for several Dutch and Belgian artists as Romeo, Ruth Jacott, Dana Winner, Helmut Lotti and of course Barbara Dex.  In 1995 he restarted the group 'Time Bandits' with some older and newer songs.

3. ELSIE MORAÏS - "Amore loco"
   (text & music: Piet Van Den Heuvel & Roel De Ruijter)

   Elsie Marina Moraïs is the fullname of the next artist.  Born on November 25th 1986 and comes from Antwerpen. She has a Belgian mother but her father comes from Kape Verde.  Elsie got two brothers.  Her father sings and plays the piano, her brother Nelson (20) is a Beat-Boxer.  Elsie is studying tourism.  As a little child Elsie was singing before the mirror.  Later on she participated at several contests with lots of succes.  This succes made her to go to the musicacademy in Antwerpen where she learned to sing, play flute and piano.

4. ASTRID - "Don't you stop the music"
   (text: Dirk Paelinck - music: Marc Paelinck)

   Astrid Roelants comes from Leuven and saw the liveslight for the first time on the 18th of April 1983. She's studying audio-visual arts at the Rits in Brussels.  Before the age of 14 her singing carreer didn't go further than the shower of the mirror.  Her first real step in the musicworld was made by her performance at Free Stage in Leuven.  She won the contest and her love for music grows.  After that Astrid participated at lots of songcontests as 'The Golden Voice', 'The Soundmixshow' and 'Idol 2003'.

5. XANDEE - "1 Life"
   (text : Dirk Paelinck - music: Marc Paelinck)

   Xandee is the artistname of Sandy Boets. She born on december 18th 1978 and comes from Tienen.  As teenager she started her career together with Sergio Quisquater.  They formed 'Touch of Joy' and had a lot of succes.  After some time of rest the group was formed again in the summer of 2003.  Near her performance with 'Touch of joy' she also workes on her own singing career as Sandy.

6. RAF VAN BRUSSEL - "Chemistry"
   (text & music: Raf Van Brussel)

   Raf Van Brussel was born on March 23, 1971 in Mortsel in Belgium but lives in Lint with his wife Ine Van Den Brande. His father, Dirk Van Brussel, has a company and his mother, Els, is a nursery-school teacher. Together with his sister, Sabine, he grew up in a normal, happy family in Berchem.  Raf went to the 'Sint-Stanislas college'. In the 3rd and later in the 5th class, Raf had to stay down the class. The man himself says: "It wasn't because I was stupid or something, I just had a lot of fun and I've never felt sorrow about that." The real reason was that during that time Raf had become more interested in music. Although he never learned any staff notation, he was playing in a band with some friends and they were rehearsing as often as possible.  At the age of 15, Raf was playing theatre for kids. He got the role of Gnome Kappons, which was really difficult, because he had to respond on the reaction of the audience (=the children) reacted. Raf's parents often visited some friends in the Netherlands, but there wasn't much to do for a teenager like Raf. But he could surf there, which he really enjoyed. When he was about 16 years old, he didn't come with them anymore and that was also the end of his surfing.  Raf had 2 uncles who worked at the air force, so in his youth he sometimes watched the planes. He really got fascinated into planes. At the age of 20, he learned to be a pilot but he didn't pass through his entrance exam, cause there were too many people who had the same ambition like Raf. He was so unhappy when he heard this that he went to a party of regents with a friend. He was really excited about that, so he decided to learn to be a teacher English – History - Geography. His parents thought he was crazy, when they first heard about this. Again his passion for music was there to destroy his plans. In the meantime Raf and some schoolmates had started a band, called ‘Liquid’. Raf didn't finish his studies, because he spent more time with his mates. A few years later he started working as a representative in the company of his father and in a company of cleaning products. The clients loved him, especially the female part.  In the meantime Raf was playing in a band with some schoolmates called "Liquid". Later he heard about Claus Jacobs and Danny Dickers searching for a singer for their band "Sunny Side Up" and solicited for the job of front man. After a few tests he got the job and after been searching for a record company who was interested, it went fast.  In the summer of 1998, Danny and Claus decided to leave the band and Raf released one more single under the band's name: "If You Could See Me Now". But this one wasn't a success. Raf needed some time sit back and think about his career. In the meantime he started singing in the cover band Plane Vanilla that existed of Robert Mosuse (The radios, Robbie Crown), Vincent (Dinky Toys) and some great musicians. Raf was one of the guest singers. In the summer of 1999 Raf was back again with his first solo single ‘Running down the road’.

7. NATALIA - "Higher than the sun"
   (text & music: Yurek Onzia & Vincent Pierens)

   Natalia Druyts come on earth on December the 3th of 1980.  She studies translator/interpreter English and Spanish but music was her biggest passion.  She started singing in a band called 'Secret Me'.  Later on she sings a duett with Danny Wuyts.  When her father met Hans Otten, they only talk of Natalia's singingtalent.  Hans Otten advise her to subscribe for 'Idol 2003'.  She gets to the finale but ended second after Peter Evrard.  Due to her participation at 'Idol 2003' she gets a contract at BMG.  She releases her first single "Without you" who became a golden record in Belgium.

   THE RESULTS

   Artists/Jury Professional Jury (*) Radio 2 Radio Donna Euro-Jury Televoting TV1-jury TOTAL PLACE Roxane 4 1 7 2 6 20 5 Barbara Dex & Alides 5 7 4 4 10 30 3 Elsie Moraïs 7 4 2 5 8 26 4 Astrid 1 3 1 1 2 8 7 Xandee 9 9 5 9 18 50 1 Raf Van Brussel 2 2 3 3 4 14 6 Natalia 3 5 9 7 14 38 2

   (*) Professional jury contains: Dana Winner, André Vermeulen, Marcel Van Thilt and Serge Simonart.