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BZN music biography continued...

in Volendam, originally consisted of Jan Veerman (vocals), Cees Tol (guitar), Evert Woestenburg (guitar) Jan Tuyp (bass guitar) and Gerrit Woestenburg (drums). Its name was short for Band zonder Naam or "Band Without a Name." Originally, the group played Bee Gee's influenced harmony pop, but in the early Seventies, they switched to hard rock and had their first successes, including a bunch of Top 40 hits. After original singer Veerman left and drummer Keizer took his place behind the microphone, the band made another musical about face and opted for commercial radio pop, adding female co-vocalist Annie Schilder and laying the foundation for their status as the most popular Dutch band ever in terms of hit singles and albums. BZN's superstardom began with the song "Mon Amour" (1976), which held the #1 Dutch hit parade ranking for over 5 weeks. Outside of the Netherlands the band has had some success as well, amongst which several hits in South Africa (such as "Yeppa" in 1990) and minor successes with their French-language songs in Canada.
The years have seen many lineup changes on BZN, with the most critical being the departure of Schilder in 1984 (replaced by Carola Smit) and in 1988 of the brothers Cees and Thomas Tol (keyboards), who until then had been responsible for most of the music and lyrics. The band remained hit makers nevertheless attempting their last major change in strategy when they decided to write in Dutch instead of English as of 2003. BZN are also responsible for launching the solo career of singer Jan Smit, who was discovered by BZN at the age of 10 and went on to have success in the pop markets in The Netherlands, Germany and Belgium. On February 15, 2006, BZN announced they would do one final tour and then call it quits. The goodbye tour ended on June 16, 20007, but not before a whole new generation of European fans got to discover BZN's music.