Giuseppe Marchese

Biography
Giuseppe ‘Pino’ Marchese has been an important factor in Belgium’s record studios since the early 1970s. In his early years, he mainly worked as a pianist and bass player; he was involved in the recordings of ‘Ça plane pour moi’ (Lou Deprijck/Plastic Bertrand) and ‘Born to be alive’ (Patrick Hernandez). Other artists he worked for as an instrumentalist include Kris Debruyne, Two Man Sound, and Francis Goya. Somewhat later, he started writing arrangements for various singers, such as Barry & Eileen, Rocco Granata, and Will Tura. He is occasionally credited as a composer as well, for example for Franck Olivier. Since the 1990s, Marchese mostly worked with Flemish-language artists: Luc Steeno, Christoff, Wendy Van Wanten, Dana Winner, and John Terra, to name just a few.

Giuseppe Marchese had been disco singer Emly Starr’s arranger for three years already, when she was chosen by Flemish BRT to represent Belgium in the 1981 Eurovision Song Contest with ‘Samson’, a song written by Penny Els, producer Kick Dandy, and Marchese himself. Giuseppe Marchese wrote the orchestration and conducted the RTÉ Concert Orchestra in Dublin during the Belgian performance. Fifteen years later, in 1996, Marchese arranged another Belgian entry, ‘Liefde is een kaartspel’, composed by John Terra and sung by Lisa Del Bo. In both the Belgian preselection and the international final, this song was conducted by Bob Porter.

In due course, a more extensive biography of Giuseppe Marchese will be published on this website