Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

Yet another failure for the UK in Eurovision hasn't been unnoticed by several big names. Simon Cowel l, the music tycoon says he would love to knock the “nul points” habit on the head by choosing the UK song for Europe. Simon says: “One hundred per cent I’d love to take the reins for Eurovision. I have thought about it. The idea of taking it on for one year and trying to get someone to represent the UK, someone new – I’d love that. I don’t think there’d be too much to lose. I think it’d be great fun.” Great fun? Well, what is he waiting for? Some others are not thinking it as great fun though, like Pop Idol‘s first ever winner Will Young who was asked if he would represent the UK at Eurovision. He didn’t mince his words. “No, I don’t think so because it’s going to be a bit of a poisoned chalice. I don’t want to do it. Please don’t make me do it.” For me that sounds more like a wish to make him do it. He wants it, can't just admit it :-)  Former X Factor runner-up Ol...

Italy's perfect couple is back together. Last night they celebrated their reunion in Arena di Verona, the Roman amphitheatre built in 1st century. 15.000 people in the arena and millions at home watched the (over run) live spectacle with many guests as the couple relived their career and life  & love story with live orchestra and their music and family. The couple married in 1970 and separated in 1999. In between numerous hits, victory in Sanremo, two Eurovision song contests, films, solo albums and several kids. The disappearance of their daughter Ylenia in 1994 marked the end of an era. They cancelled all their gigs. One more album was released in 1995 but they didn't perform anymore together. Al Bano went solo in 1996 while Romina left the spotlight, convinced Ylenia was still alive somewhere. Later she moved back to the USA.  In 2013 they were again on same stage for the first time in Russia, followed by concert in the USA and Canada in 2014 and a mini tournee i...

Marco Mengoni's success continues as ever. Io ti aspetto , released today is the third single off his latest multiplatinum selling album Parole in Circolo and sets us in a party mood. It follows Guerriero and Essere umani , two megasuccesses already in Italy with some 34 million views on VEVO. 

The national broadcasting network in Bosnia & Herzegovina is close to collapse, states EBU in a statement that you can read here . This network includes BHRT, that has been responsable for the country's Eurovision song contest participations. In this light it's very unlikely we will see Bosnia & Herzegovina in Sweden 2016. Shame.  The country has been last seen on Eurovision stage back in 2012, when Maya Sar placed 18th. They debuted back in 1993 with the legendary voting call from the war zone and we finally heard "This is Sarajevo calling" to a spontaneous applause in the arena. They also survived every semifinal and were always present in the final scoring six top-10 places and 3rd at best, with Hari Mata Hari's Lejla in 2006. After a shaky start they gave us some great entries the lst few years. You can check them all below...

As soon as the Vienna 2015 edition of Eurovision song contest was over the new reigning country Sweden started the preparations for the 2016 contest. The venue, most likely Tele2 Arena in Stockholm (but then, SVT surprised us with Malmö on 2013) will be chosen and announced by August. But the namedropping has started for the possible presenters. Last time it was Petra Mede, who did a marvellous job even if some in Europe didn't apparently like her style. I loved it. At least I remember her, I can't say the same about the three ladies this year.... Errr... who were they? What did they do? All I remember is Conchita! Anyways, Petra Mede was dropped by Christer Björkman the day after, along with Sanna Nielsen and Gina Dirawi , both names from Melodifestivalen where they did a good job.  Another professional host, or the reigning Eurovision winner Måns Zelmerlöw has been put in the list immediately, too. And we can't forget Sarah Dawn Finer , that all of Eurovision Eur...

RAI has published the televotes given in the second semifinal and the final in the Eurovison song contest 2015 in Vienna last week. Remarkable is the amount of invalid votes in the final, where Italy was participating. My guess is they are mostly all votes for Italy. Italians still aren't believing the fact they can't vote for their own entry it seems :-) The fact that the invalid votes in the semifinal were ten times less where Italy was not participating only underlines this idea.... And one can't deny the diaspora voting is reigning also in Italy. The biggest immigrant groups or Albanians (nearly a million) and Romanians (over a million) scored over 50% of the votes! In the second semifinal San Marino scores the second highest amount of televotes after Poland (nearly 100.000 Poles living in Italy). Check below the full scores. 

If you thought only artists and their teams are nervous and excited on the big night, imagine the spokespersons! There were a lot of nervous giggle and laugher, a lot of hairstyling and make up mixing, someone even double checked her nails. Finland's Krista Siegfrids and Dutch Edsilia Rombley were taking care of their noses with a noisy sneezes while waiting. "It's fun but it's nerve wrecking, Jesus Christ!" the latter exploded at one point. They are there waiting and waiting forever for their 60 seconds or so on screen, and sometimes you don't even get on screen when you are supposed to like happened with Georgia, one of those voting misses in this year's show. Actually there were several connection fails, something that haven't happened for year. Natia Bunturi wasn't amused as you can see below... Technical difficulties also pushed Portugal and Estonia to vote as the last countires instead of their re-scheduled slots. But Estonia's...

After Albanian Elhaida Dani - who represent her country in the Eurovision song contest this year -and Sicilian nun Sister Cristina we have a 27-year-old street musicians claiming the price: Fabio Curto. Born in deep south, Calabria, he now lives in Bologna. He's an all around musicians playing several instruments but he has also graduated in Political sciences, in crimionology. But music is his life and he's also involved as violin player in a Balcan music band. Here is his blind audition . 

The numbers are out and it has been a rather good year for YLE what comes to Eurovision song contest 2015 in Vienna. The first semifinal where Finland was, and not qualified, has a peak at 1.621.000 viewers and average of 871.000. The second semifinal peaked at 667.000 (with average of 330.000) as there was no Finland. The die hard PKN fans were not interested anymore in it, as the final peaked at 1.332.000 losing nearly 300.000 viewers (with the average of 632.000). All in all the first semifinal was the most watched tv-programme in any Finnish channel that week, while the final was 16th - on the other hand ahead of it are only tv-news and two episodes of a popular Finnish daily soap  opera Salatut elämät . The semifinal two is at no. 100....

28-year-old Polina started her career in a tv-talent show (just like Måns and Il Volo). After winning it she though joined a girlband before going solo. She managed to release her debut album before marrying and having a child and gaining 20 kilos (to those extra 20 kilos she claims she had back then). The marriage failed, she started her career again, released another album, lost her 40 kilos, dyed her hair blond and had a string of hits and even had time to remarry and show off her new naked body in a men's magazine before she heard a million voices. Now that's a trasformation!

Shy and lean 19-year-old Måns Zelmerlöw made his first steps in the spotlight ten years ago when entering Idols 2005. Eventually he would finish only 5th but his talent was noted and in the years to come he has been participating (and winning) Let's dance and hosted some major entertainment shows, including Melodifestivalen and Allsång på Skansen, a Swedish institution. He has starred in several musicals and scored a few hits from his three albums. However he needed to take part in Melodifestivalen three times before winning it. But the third try made him a hero as he also won Eurovision. Not only because of his song and voice, but he's handsome habitus. He surely has gotten some muscles and more hair over the years...... and has grown into a allround entertainer. 

Il Volo came to be back in 2009 in a tv talent show for young voices. They entered separately, Gianluca won but Il Volo (after a few name changes) was born. The three guys, aged 14-16 went on to an international fame, recorded four albums, toured the world seven times before coming home to Sanremo 2015 festival, winning it and doing Eurovision. They won the European wide televote my landslide, but finished third altogether. Over the past six years they have grown from teenage boys to men, lost a few (or in Ignazio's case quite a many!) kilos and babyfat, developed a fashion sense and today they look just like Italian popopera teenage heartdrops should. Perfect transformation!

Måns was born in June 13 (a Friday!) 1986 in Lund, south of Sweden. His first experience in the show business was being part of the cast of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcot at Malmö's Slagthuset.  December 26, 2004 he and his family survived the tsunami in Khao Lak, Thailand. His first step to real notoriety was Idols 2005 where he placed fifth after Agnes Carlson, Sebastian Karlsson, Sibel (all of them tried their luck in Melodifestivalen later) and Jens Pääjärvi who seems to have disappeared from the spotlight years ago already. Curiously his audition song was Hero .  Next year he was dancing in Let's dance partnered with Maria Bild and made himself even more popular and won the whole show.   That lead to the role of Danny Zuko in musical Grease in Malmö and he signed his first record deal. His lucky break comes in 2007 when he enters Melodifestivalen with Cara mia , after two songs had been disqualified and his was one of the two replacem...

Eurovision winner Måns Zelmerlöw returned home to Lund near Malmö today with a big welcome party at town's central square creating a happy chaos. The public demand for him to take over the hosting job next year is growing every minute and he has promised to think about it if he gets offered the job. SVT and local medias were streaming the event on websites just like his return home to Arlanda airport yesterday. Check out these photos from Expressen . Watch some here . 

The lights have hardly been turned off in Wiener Stadthalle and here we have news for the next edition in Sweden, most likely Stockholm. Ukraine is ready for a comeback after this year's absense, according General Diretor of NTU.  Wouldn't it be great to have one of those spectacular unforgettabe stagings again?  Turkey has stayed away already three years but rumours from Ankara tell they may have had a change of heart and return. Hopefully! And who knows we will have Australia competing again, and what about China ? Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Malta, Netherlands and of course Sweden have so far confirmed their participation in 2016.

If Australia did its best ratings so far, so did Italy. The country has had a rocky restart what comes to viewings since its comeback but it's been steadily growing and this year breaks all the previous records. The final has been followed in average by 3.292.000 viewers with a peak at 4.786.000 making it the third most watched programme of the evening right after major channels Rai1 and Canale5.  The first semifinal that was ment to be showed live for the first time but then cancelled and showed on Wednesday night at 11pm gathered anyway 212.000 with the peak at 314.000. The second semifinal where Italy voted got 792.000 and 1.092.000 peak.  Eurovision has been also a success on Twitter.  We didn't get to Torino 2016 but maybe 2017? Italy and RAI are ready. And meanwhile Il Volo will fly to European success..... 

We all knew Aussies were crazy for Eurovision and now that they were able to take part and scored a great 5th place with Guy Sebastian's Tonight again even more so. Hundreds of them gathered together at 5am in the fresh Australian fall to watch the show together on megascreen provided by SBS in Melbourne. 263.000 even watched it live on television at that hour, and nearly 600.000 the replay at 7.30pm later that day. All in all the semifinals and the final gathered 2,1 million vievers with a peak over 4,2 million. Not bad at all! The burning queston now is of course will EBU let them back next year again, despite the original plan of one year only. I would say Yip!

The votes were taken by a very few countries this year and Italy's Il Volo managed only third even if almost in any other year they would have won just like Russian Polina. Indeed, they scored the same monstruous points as Lordi did when they broke the records back in 2006 and won. Basicly they would have won every year but 2015, 2012 or 2009. Here's the all time top-10 what comes to amount of points gathered: 1. Norway - Alexander Rybak - Fairytale - Winner 2009 (387) 2. Sweden - Loreen - Euphoria - Winner 2012 (372) 3. Sweden - Måns Zelmerlöw - Heroes - Winner 2015 (365) 4. Russia - Polina Gagarina - A million voices - 2nd in 2015 (303) 5. Italy - Il Volo - Grande amore - 3rd in 2014 (292 - 9 x 12 points) 6. Finland - Lordi - Hard rock hallelujah - Winner 2006 (292 - 6 x 12 points) 7. Austria - Conchita Wurst - Rise like a Phoenix - Winner 2014 (290) 8. Denmark - Emmelie De Forest- Only teardrops - Winner 2013 (281) 9. Russia - Dima Bilan - Believ...

News from Russia tell in the Finnish media that Russia pretty much censored Conchita Wurst from the screen in the Eurovision final! Not an easy task as she was hosting the green room, performing several times and interviewing people and even flying in the show. She was everywhere (and I am not complaining! I want a Conchita Show on TV asap!)  How to do it? Easy, you switch on to Andrei Malahov's talk show when she sings, put on adds when she interviews people including their own Polina Gagarina and if nothing else helps you can always show the audience in the talk show studio instead..... Now, EBU, what are you going to do for that? Isn't it the rule one must broascast the show as it is (Itay got a special permission for doing it their way when they returned in 2011) Let's wait and see....

The final is over, the votes are in and Sweden has won! Beating Russia and Italy who battled it out for the first part of the voting.... Stay tuned for full results and other stuff.... in a moment!

If Italy wins the televoting record breakingly the same hapens in the jury votes but with Sweden. Sweden gains 9,1 votes from every jury in average and 104 points more than the second one, Latvia. Russia managed third but Italy is snobbed and left distant six with average 4,4 points. The Finnish jury is a good example: Italy was third most televoted but the jury placed it only 19th. What happened to voting for vocals and hit potential?  Anyways, I repeat now what I have said and thought already before: The juries are good and there must be juries but they are way too small. There needs to be more people. Five people is way too limited and small. There should be at least ten, or preferably 15 like the good old days when they were 16 for years. One's individual dislikes wouldn't count that much, and one can't over talk the other four to not to like a certain entry so easily and make all vote against it. 

So, Italy took 80 points more than second placed Russia in televotes and Sweden managed only third. The came Belgium and Estonia, Australia and Israel before jury's favorite Latvia. Il Volo suffered the same fate as in Sanremo: common people love then, the juries snob them. In Sanremo's different way of counting and mixing the various votes gave them a victory in the end despite all, in Eurovision they were left third. I have nothing against the jury, mind you. There must be a jury but maybe the one currenty in use is a bit too limited? More about that in the jury vote post.... Oh, and Austria scored a flat zero, what do you think they scored with the juries? ;-) As they put it: "We are the zeroes of our time..." And did you realize? 366 votes, that's 9,4 average from every country! That must be a record of all time! Correct me if I am wrong....

Semifinal two was won by Sweden with a huge margin while Latvia and Israel battled it out for the second place. Azerbaijan nearly missed out the final and San Marino avoided the last place by beating Switzerland with 7 points.  Full results here .  01. Sweden  217 02. Latvia  155 03. Israel  151 04. Norway  123 05.  Slovenia  92 06. Cyprus  87 07. Lithuania  67 08. Poland  57 09. Montenegro  57 10. Azerbaijan  53 11. Malta  43 12. Ireland  35 13. Czech Republic  33 14. Portugal  19 15. Iceland  14 16. San Marino  11 17. Switzerland  4

Now it's time to say it again: What did I say? Finland came last in the first semifinal, that was won by Russia. Here are the results (and full results here ) 01. Russia 182 02. Belgium  149 03. Estonia  105 04. Gerogia  98 05. Romania  89 06. Greece  81 07. Armenia 77 08. Hungary  67 09. Serbia  63 10. Albania  62 11. Moldova  41 12. Belarus  39 13. Denmark  33 14. Netherlands  33 15. Macedonia  28 16. Finland  13

I did the my usual place the country in a slot prediction just minutes before the show and here's the outcome: 18/27 right, not bad. The top was fine, the bottom very fine but in the middle it was so and so, but then so was the voting, too....  Will place 1-5 Australia Estonia Italy Russia Sweden  Will place 6-10 Azerbaijan Hungary Montenegro Norway Romania Will place 11-15 Belgium Georgia Israel Latvia Slovenia Will place 16-20 Albania Armenia Greece   Lithuania   Serbia  Will place 21-27 Austria Cyprus France  Germany Poland Spain UK

There it is. Very weirdly spread votes as the top-3 is way ahead of the three next than way ahead of the next three and then comes a huge drop for the rest. Once again Italy is the only Big5 doing any success as the other four ended up in bottom 7...... I'm happy for Belgium and Australia, also Latvia but I had Estonia in my top-5 (as I predicted the other four right). Norway, Israel, Serbia... I expected Azerbaijan and Slovenia doing better, and France of course but otherwise it's pretty much as I predicted at large.

Here we are. Again. Tonight's the night and by the end of it we will have a new Eurovision hero and know where to book our spring break trip next year. Maybe.  Join me after for comments and results and all the rest.  And most of all: Enjoy the show, may the bes tone win and have fun!

The annual Marcel Bezençon awards have been voted once again and here are the winners: The Composer award goes to Norway and Kjetil Mørland . The Press award goes to Italy's Il Volo and The Artistic award , voted by the commentators in Vienna goes to Sweden and Måns Zelmerlöw Here's a video

My Flying reporter Robert caught last year's bronze medalist Sanna Nielsen on camera and she sends wishes to you all and hopes, no she knows Måns Zelmerlöw will make Sweden proud tonight. What do you think? Is Måns the man tonight?