#1 This Week In 1968

This week in 1968, Paul Mauriat's instrumental cover of Greek singer Vicky Leandros' Love Is Blue spent the last of its five weeks at #1 on the Billboard pop chart. Representing Luxembourg, Leandros finished 4th with her French version of the song at the 1967 Eurovision Song Contest. Leandros went on to win Eurovision for Luxembourg in 1972 with Apres Toi.

Mauriat's version is the biggest U.S. success ever for a song that was a Eurovision entry. (I believe ABBA's 1974 Eurovision-winning Waterloo, which reached #6 here, is the second-most successful, though I might be wrong about that.) Mauriat is also the only French artist ever to have a #1 single on the U.S. pop chart. In 1976 Mauriat released a disco version called Love Is Still Blue, which I consider to be the worst single in the history of the revered Salsoul Records. Mauriat died in 2006 at age 81. Vicky Leandros continues to perform and had moderate success in the late 90's with a dance version of the theme from Titanic.

TRIVIA: The vocal version of Love Is Blue has been covered in English by numerous artists including Johnny Mathis, Mitzi Gaynor, Marty Robbins, and gay singer Stephin Merritt of the Magnetic Fields. Jeff Beck's cover was a minor hit the same year as Mauriat's.

RELATED: Like millions of others, I had to perform Love Is Blue for my fifth grade piano recital.

UPDATE: Totally wrong about ABBA. See comments!