Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

  This week Italian tormentoni goes tropical with Boomdabash featuring Annalisa, Elisa jojns Matilda,  Loredana Bertè joins Franco123 and finally Giuni Russo delivers the summer banger of bangers, written by Franco Battiato 40 summers ago and hit ever since every year. Boomdabash / Annalisa - Tropicana Elisa / matilda de Angelis - Litoranea Franco123 / Loredana Bertè - Mare malinconia Giuni Russo - Un'estate al mare

  The favorite came and conquered both televoters and jury. Sanja Ilic (66) is no stranger to Eurovision having participated in the Yogoslavian national finals already in the 1970's and his song Hallo, hallo represented Yogoslavia back in 1982.  But Balkanika is something else. He started Balkanika in 2000 with young talented local musicians playing traditional instruments and the group has been evolving and developing ever since. The group today has 10 members including two female vocalists with etno sound and one male vocalist with rock sound. They have also toured the world already..... Oh, after Greece this! Eurovision is getting back to what it should be Sanja Ilić & Balkanika "Nova deca"     12 12 24 Saška Janks "Pesma za tebe"    10 10 20 Dušan Svilar "Pod krošnjom bagrema" 8 7 15 Lord "Samo nek se okreće" 6 6 12 Biber & DJ Niko Bravo "Svatovi"  7 5 12 Ivan Kurt...

Timo Kojo, commonly known as "Zero Kojo" turns 64 today. He earned the nickname in the 1982 Eurovision and ever since he's been the prime example of Finland's failures in the contest. Being a good sport, he's apparently taken pride of it and even these days spits it out if he doesn't like the Finnish entry, like Sing it away last year..... in a bit of an old grumpy man style :-) Congratulations!

The very first German Eurovision song contest winner Nicole has finally given in to her roots: he has recorded an album full of Eurovision winners! The album comes out later this week - almost exactly 35 years after her win - and includes 13 winners plus a few other versions of those songs. Included is of course her very own Ein bisschen Frieden , but also from recent years Euphoria and Only teardrops , oldies like Waterloo, Apres toi and Save your kisses for me  not forgetting the Johnny Logan classics and some not so obvious ones like Insieme: 1992 . All in German on top of that. The Olsen brothers and Hape Kerkeling also appear on the album.  Maybe she got inspired in the London Eurovision Greatest Hits concert last year where she had to be literally dragged off the stage when she just kept enjoying the applause that went on and on? The album comes also with a special Fan Box editions with a lot of goodies. 

Turkish Ayşe Özyılmazel who is Neco's daughter has covered his father's Eurovision 1982 entry Hani for Turkey, and Neco himself is seen in the video. I remember liking the song back then - yes, I'm that old – and Ayşe makes it all very sweet and cute, and the arragement is pretty much the same. But it is not the first time Eurovision kids cover their parents songs. Danish Rasmus Seebach covered his father's 1993 Eurovision entry Under stjernerne på himlen (and did a great job with it!) and in Finland Milana Misic has recorded various songs by her mother Laila Kinnunen, including her 1961 Eurovision entry Valoa ikkunassa . Surely there are more similar cases (hints are welcome in the comment box!). I have a burning desire to have Taikapeili girls Hanna-Riikka Siitonen (Fredi's daughter) and Nina Tapio (backing singer's daughter) cover the Finnish entry Pump pump from 1976. How cool would that be?! Both girls have also multiple Eurovision backing singer exper...

The Euro Fan Cafe had organized a tribute to Ralph Siegel last Saturday. Rick Jacobs interviewed him about his songs and long career, the over 20 songs he has had in the Eurovision, and a few dozen more in various national finals. On Cafe's Facebook fans were able to vote beforehand the best or the most popular Siegel songs over the years and they were then discussed in detail. A lot of memories for Ralph, and a lovely walk down the memory lane. Valentina Monetta, his latest muse was present of course as was the whole Sammarinese delegation in Copenhagen 2014. Part of it, including Valentina's backing singers, Head of delegation Alessandro Capicchioni, lyricist Mauro Balestri and art director Fabrizio Raggi also surprised Ralph with Volare (Nel blu dipinto di blu) that they sung together. The real surprise of the evening however was Nicole, who won Eurovision 1982 for Ralph and Germany with Ein bisschen Frieden . A very entertaining and warm spirited evening for everyone pr...

Endless are the ways to select the Eurovision entry. November 2, 2012 a special advisory board will meet with the TRT committee to discuss the next Turkish entry. All this after TRT's general director İbrahim Şahin earlier this year said Turkey is done with Eurovision and will be in Baku 2012 only because it's Baku. He also criticized the televoting system maybe forgetting Turkey is one country that has benefited from it the most perhaps! All this is now past them and Turkey will indeed be in Malmö 2013.  The advisory board includes several previous Turkish represents along with other musicians, TV and radio personalities. I wonder what the outcome will be? I hope Turkey would bring back the real flavor of their music and hopefully also the language! Will they all agree it's time for Tarkan finally? :-) Can Bonomo (2012), Ferhan Akgül (maNga 2010), Harun Tekin (Mor Ve Ötesi 2008), Sertab Erener (2003), Kayahan Acar and Demet Sağır...

Eurovision 1982 is one of the Finnish Eurovision turning points. Kojo scored a flat zero in Harrogate while the other peace song Ein bisschen Frieden sailed to victory. The result got Europe asking if Finns are serious and are we doing it on purpose but we were not. When Kojo's Nuku pommiin was selected we thought we had a chance. The song was different in a in-your-face style. When Kojo returned home with null points the selecting jury was blamed and featured in newspapers with face photos like dangerous criminals, Kojo was treated as a national traitor, bottles were thrown at him in gigs and still today, after 30 years, he is known as Nolla-Kojo aka Zero-Kojo.  " Now I'm laughing only about it " he recalls in Iltalehti's recent interview. "It's ridiculous how this one mediocre song has caused so much hassle. After 30 years people still talk about it! " In 1982 Kojo had also another song in the final called Video-Venus that came 3rd. " ...

It has been funny to read the comments here and there in chatrooms and blogs when both Finns and especially foreigners have been outraged that we Finns send a song in Swedish to the Eurovision song contest 2012 in Baku. Finland is a bilingual country. That seems to be big news to most of them. Some even argue (with Finns) that it is not. I tell, it is. Also, this is not the first time we send a song in Sweish. Fri? by Beat in 1990 was in Swedish. We have had countless songs in Swedish in the national finals over the years, and even some of them have been runner ups, Mitt äppelträd in 1982 and Svart och vitt in 1988 come to mind easily. There is a chance this När jag blundar might be translated fully or partly into English but Pernilla herslef has expressed a wish it stays in Swedish and I doubt YLE will force her to change that. And what comes to Pernilla being a Swedish speaker. So? What about Axel Ehnström aka Paradise Oskar, Nina Åström, Ami Aspelund, Riki Sorsa, Monica Aspe...

First Class Knight of the Royal Norwegian Order of St. Olav Jahn Teigen. How does that sound to you? That's what he was awardeb by the King Harald V for his services to the public as a musician and  for his humanitary work. No one can deny his influence in the Norwegian popular music even if the past few years he has pretty much retired to a house in the Swedish countryside with the exception of a summer tour in Norway last year with Anita Skorgan. He started with Eurovision back in 1974 and since have participated in the national final 16 times and won three times ( 1978 , 1982 , 1983 ). His last participation to date is in 2005 with fantastic My heart is my home .

We all know by now that Lena's Satellite is in the charts all over the place from Australia to Austria, but did you know it is only the 7th Eurovision winner that hits #1 in Finland? And for the first time two Eurovision winners in a row make it? (Well, I personally think one can't compare today's digital charts to those good old days when you had to go and buy the physical single but that's another story....). Germany is also the only country that has managed to make two of its winners #1's in Finland and it took her only 5 days while it took 3 weeks for Rybak last year...  Anyways, between 1971-1984 all the winners were charting in Finland, and with one exception all of them also made the top-10. The biggest of them all is though France's last winner L'oiseau et l'enfant by Marie Myriam as the song also charted in two different Finnish cover versions, by Katri Helena and Merja Rantamäki .  Here are all the Eurovision winner number ones in Finland: ...

Lena Meyer-Landrut, or simply Lena these days will release her debut album next week titled My cassette player. Naturally it includes her entry for Oslo 2010 Satellite as well as her two other entries in the finalissima Bee and Love me , plus two songs she sung on the previous rounds of the selection process Unser Star für Oslo: My same and Mr Curiosity . The album will come in two different forms, the deluxe version including a DVD. Lena-mania is high in Germany and based on pre-sales the album is already #4 in the Amazon.de. But Lena is used to breaking records by now and hit number one. Satellite was #1 for five weeks and has sold by now over 300.000 copies making it a platinum single. It also helds the record of fastest download when it was downloaded over 150.000 times in a week. The album will surely break more records.... She's also charting elsewhere. She made it to #2 in both Switzerland and Austria and is charting in Luxembourg and Hungary at the moment. And maybe in l...

Non so che? Non so che darei , one of the maybe forgotten Italian entries by Alan Sorrenti, anno 1980. The Olsen Brothers are celebrating the 10th anniversary of their win with Fly on the wings of love with a new album made of Eurovision covers titled Wings of Eurovision including of course their own updated to 2010. The other songs are Congratulations , Waterloo , Ein bisschen Frieden , Främling , Save all your kisses for me , Hallelujah , Boom bang a bang , Volare , La det swinge , Love shine a light and Rock'n roll kids . Some choices sound very suited for the gentleman, the others... well, we just have to wait til late May to hear how they manage with them!

Norwegian Eurovision legend Jahn Teigen turned 60 last month and Norske Posten celebrates the event with two stamps. But this is not the first time a Nordic Eurovision star gets a stamp: Lena Philipsson had one already in 1991! Teigen has participated in the Norwegian final 14 times between 1974 and 2005, winning 4 times but represanting Norway only 3 times, once scoring the flat zero.

Apparently Anna Vissi's version was released before Kylie Minogue's but it didn't go anywhere while Kylie had a big hit with it and took the first step to make a real grand come back with Can't get you out of my head a bit later. And indeed, Kylie has something in her version La Vissi can only dream of, lifting the song to a new level of a dance classic... http:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfER3jhUC2E and http:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=51OTH85l0fo

Harrogate in North Yorkshire hosted the 27th Eurovision on April 24, 1982. The opening of the contest was used to tell people where Harrogate is as no one ever heard of the town before (or after for that matter). Only 18 countries took part when France, Italy and Greece decided to stay home. Two songs of peace are remembered from this contest; Finland's  Nuku pommiin and the winner, Germany's Ein bisschen Frieden . Finland scored a flat zero while Germany took the most convincing win ever at that point. It got 1,61 times the votes the runner up  Israel got. Ralph Siegel finally won after  Dschingis Khan (4th in 1979),  Theater (2nd in 1980) and  Johnny Blue (2nd in 1981) and Nicole started a very succesful career as the ultimate German schlager queen that continues even today. The song charted all over Europe selling over 3 million copies in various languages Nicole recorded (German, English, French, Dutch, Italian, Spanish, Danish, Russian...) and is the l...