Currently Eurovision’s smallest regular contestant by far (Monaco no longer enters), San Marino brings a distinctly tongue-in-cheek (well, actually completely bonkers) attitude to the contest, but I’m so pleased they continue to enter (and at time of writing they have just confirmed their participation in 2018’s contest) – it makes Eurovision that much more fun to have at least one of the microstates taking part. Of course San Marino at Eurovision is synonymous with one contestant in particular…. Valentina Monetta!
Staying (roughly) in the Balkans, this top 5 comes just before I’m due to see one my favourite Eurovision performers of recent years at Eurofest at the RVT – the wonderful Poli Genova – so it’s a perfect time to look at my top 5 from her country, Bulgaria. Continue reading “My top 5 songs from…Bulgaria”
Coinciding with a football match taking place as I post this, I’m staying with the Balkans to focus on Slovenia. In many ways, Slovenia is closer to Austria and Italy than to the other ex-Yugoslav countries. In Eurovision terms that has meant Slovenia has not benefited from Balkan block voting quite as much as the others. Continue reading “My top 5 songs from…Slovenia”
One area of Europe I have barely touched thus far in my Top 5s are the Balkans – and the break up of Yugoslavia in the 1990s brought several new countries to the contest (though we shouldn’t overlook that Yugoslavia had been in the contest for almost 30 years until its final year in 1992). First up is the second most successful of the ex-Yugoslav countries – Bosnia and Herzegovina. Continue reading “My top 5 songs from…Bosnia and Herzegovina”
This year’s hosts, and two-times winners, in spite of only being in Eurovision since 2003, Ukraine’s approach to the contest could never be described as “uninteresting”. They’s brought us Xena: Warrior princess, a giant carrying a princess, a man in a hamster wheel, a sand artist, a drag queen and her “mother”, rippling, oiled up men in skimpy silver Roman centurion outfits, and winning songs about mass deportations from now-a. Where to start picking my top 5 from this eclectic selection?! Continue reading “My top 5 songs from…Ukraine”
A little bit of sad news this week – Germany’s 1975 entrant, Joy Fleming, passed away on 27 September 2017 at the age of 72. Her song, “Ein Lied kann eine Brücke sein”, made it into my top 5 songs from Germany.
Eurovision may be some months off yet, but the Eurovision 2018 season began at the start of this month (any song publicly released from 1 September onwards is eligible for the next contest). I’ve still got many country top 5s to do before the national final season begins around Christmas, so kicking off my autumn season is that superpower of the last two decades of Eurovision – Sweden. Continue reading “My top 5 songs from…Sweden”
We have reached the summit! And I don’t think this year’s winner will come as any surprise to you It’s the second year in a row a Big 5 country has topped this chart – last year it was France, and they ultimately finished 6th in the grand final. Since their return in 2011 from a 14 year long break, two-times winners Italy have had claimed a runners up spot, a third place and two other top 10 results. They won the public vote in 2015 but came 3rd overall – will 2017 finally be Italy’s time?
Continue reading “Eurovision 2017 previews countdown: #1 ITALY – Francesco Gabbani – “Occidentali’s Karma””
In the runner’s up spot, it’s a country that has really refound its Eurovision mojo in the last couple of years. One of Eurovision’s founding countries, Belgium has had a mini-renaissance recently, with several top 10 results, not all of them expected (I certainly wasn’t expecting them to do as well last year!) There are high expectations this year, can the 17-year-old Blanche meet them and bring Belgium another top result?
Continue reading “Eurovision 2017 previews countdown: #2 BELGIUM – Blanche – “City Lights””
