Phil Coulter - Songwriting Partnership With Bill Martin

Songwriting Partnership With Bill Martin

In the late 1960s Coulter formed a long-lasting writing partnership with Bill Martin. They wrote Sandie Shaw's 1967 Eurovision-winning entry, "Puppet on a String", which would go on to become an international hit with more than 100 cover versions. They had a second hit the next year with a song for Cliff Richard called "Congratulations", which finished second at Eurovision. In a weird footnote to this achievement, in 2008 a Spanish documentary alleged that Cliff Richard had been robbed of victory after General Francisco Franco fixed the vote. Seven years later Coulter, found himself back on the Eurovision stage when he co wrote, together with Pierre Cour, the song "Toi" for Luxembourg: the song, which was performed by Coulter's future wife Geraldine, came fifth in Stockholm. Coulter and Martin also wrote "Shine It On", which finished third in the 1978 heat of A Song for Europe, performed by the Glaswegian performer "Christian".

The duo wrote numerous hit songs for a variety of popular singers in the 1960s and 1970s, including "My Boy" for Elvis Presley and many of the Bay City Rollers' hits: they also contributed incidental music to the 1967 Spider-Man television series.