Okay, I’ll concede, it was a good song. Much to everyone’s surprise, Germany went and scored douze points from almost everyone as last night’s Eurovision Song Contest 2010 grand final in Oslo. Lena Meyer-Landrut sung to victory with Satellite, and with a very simple stage show (basically just some dancing) and a very simple black dress, she won over the hearts of Europe. The former winner of Germany’s Our Star for Oslo talent show has become a global superstar quite literally overnight.
We caught this year’s event in a hot and sweaty – but friendly – bar in Paris where American, French and Irish Eurovision devotees all stood glued to the big screens, waiting for their favourite entry to have its chance. We hot-footed it back to our hotel near Gare du Nord for the voting (and still amazingly got there before it had even started), and little did we know what surprised lay in wait.
The revelation that was the most talked about (bar Lena’s success, which was all over French TV for at least a week) was the UK’s dix points. And by that, I do of course mean literally dix points. Yep, we got a measly 10 points the whole night, finishing last behind even Belarus. I think that was a little unfair. There was talk of political voting (or non-voting as the case may be) once more and a sub-standard performance, but I don’t think Josh Dubovie could have given it much more. But what of my other songs to watch? Denmark, my favourite, finished fourth with 149 points (still 97 behind Germany’s 246), while Switzerland got knocked out in the second semi-final.
Contemporary pop-sounding entries from Albania and Iceland finished 16th and 19th respectively, even though both singers gave fantastic hi-energy performances, proving that modern isn’t always the way to go. Other drop-outs included Bulgaria in the second semi, and Latvia in the first. My final tips, Armenia and Romania, did quite well, taking 7th and 3rd places respectively.
So, a pleasing result in the grand scheme of things, and some surprises, be they good or bad. Germany’s win does mean that once the venue has been announced for 2011’s 56th running of the show, we might have the most decent chance of watching it live. After all, with my German friend Rainer already living in the country, it could be two Eurovision Song Contests in a row watched from different countries in Europe…
Tags: Eurovision, Music