Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

Every now and then Eurovision song contest winners come back to the contest and looking back quite often it hasn't been such a good idea. A total of 14 previous winners have managed to return (and even more have tried but failed to win the national final. Latest of them is Swedish Loreen last year). In this series I have a brief look at them and how did it go..... 19 years old Lena Meyer-Landrut came from nowhere and after winning the German national final in 2010 went on to win the Eurovision song contest as well with her Satellite . She wasn't quite a favorite but once the votes started rolling in she took a convincing surprise win over Turkey's maNga (246 vs 170) scoring top-3 from 18 countries including nine 12s.  Her album went to #1 in Germany and  Satellite charted all over Europe making it one of the most succesful Eurovision winners of recent years. Her momemtum carried all the way to the next year's contest when it was announced she would do the 50...

The vote for the best national acts to compite for the Best European Act is over and the winners are out. For Italy it's Marco Mengoni . He was also nominated back in 2010 when he also won the Best European act.  For Germany it's Lena again. She was nominated and also won the Best European act in 2011. The category has been won now five times out of six by Eurovision artists (maNga, Mengoni, Lena, Dima Bilan) so let's see if one of them will do a double and continue the trend!  Here are all the nominees. For Finland it's Isac Elliot . EMA 2013 will take place on November 10, 2013 in Amsterdam.

The European MTV Music award nominations are out and four names familiar from Eurovision are running for the Best European Act this time. Marco Mengoni is nominated in Italy (along with Fedez, Salmo, Emma and Max Pezzali). He already won this award in 2010. In Greece it's a battle among others between Greek Sakis Rouvas and Cypriot Mihalis Hadzigiannis while in Germany Lena is among the nominees. She won this award already in 2011. We also have Auryn in Spain against Pablo Alboran . Auryn was the runner up in the Spanish selection 2011 and Alboran was heavily tipped to do Eurovision this year....  In recent year the Eurovision stars of the past (or the near future) has often been featured also in this MTV affair proving Eurovision is up to date, at least in some cases :-) But one question comes to mind.... where's Dima Bilan ? Have Russian abandoned him? Or maybe after 7 national nominations and winning last year the Best European Act it's time to give away to oth...

One more exciting thing for Eurovision fans are the spokespersons as every year several previous (and sometimes future) Eurovision entrants re-appear to announce the votes of their country, or previous hosts like this year Alsou for Russia. or she's a double as she also did Eurovision as singer. For Italy it's lovely Federica Gentile, for San Marino John Kennedy O'Connor, a very familiar name for Eurovision freaks. And Finland gives the honor to Kristiina Wheeler, who would be a great entrant herself (What are you waiting for??). Here are the ones this bloggers can pick up with the first look: Armenia - André (ESC 2007) Bulgaria - Joanna Dragneva (ESC 2007) Estonia - Rolf Roosalu (multiple national finalist) Finland - Kristiina Wheeler (singer and future ESC participant?) Germany - Lena (ESC 2010, 2011) Latvia - Anmary (ESC 2012) Norway - Tooji (ESC 2012) Russia - Alsou (ESC 2000 + hostess 2009) Sweden - Yohio (national runner up) Ukraine - Matias (m...

It's not very unusual that an artist returns to Eurovision , we have dozens of returnees over the decades. It's less common that the same artist returns two or more years in a row. That was more of a norm in the old days when Lys Assia for example did the honors for Switzerland for three years in a row (1956-58) or Udo Jürgens who apparently decided to sing for Austria until he wins and was eventually third time lucky in 1966. And what to say about the Belgian couple Fud Leclerk and Bob Benny who between them provided the Belgian entries five years in a row (1956-60-62 for Fud, 1959-61 for Benny)?! But it's the first time we have three artists doing a double in three years a row, or how to put it? We had Lena Meyer-Landrut for Germany 2010-11, Jedward for Ireland 2011-12 and now Valentina Monetta for San Marino 2012-13... As we see the trend has been about -10 places but as Valentina can't go down -10 places she will gain at least 10 positions then? Will San Marin...

I was watching Sanremo last night so I didn't care about Germany, apparenlty I lost a good show, it seems.  Cascada's Glorious was one of the pre-contest favorites and in the end won, even if the 12 points from the radiostations to LaBrassBanda seems to have been quite a shock.  Cascada got 10 anyways and Betty Diettrich 8. Then came the votes from the jury: 12 to Blitzkids, 10 to Saint Lu and 8 to Cascada while LaBrassBanda only 1! The televote awarded Cascada 12, Labrassbanda 10 and Nica & Joe 8 so Vascada got the ticket.  Lena and Loreen performed as well.... and this is the most "euphoric" entry for 2013 so far... This said, Cascada has been doing this stuff before Loreen even made her debut in TV....

After two years of Lena and one year of Lena-like selection won by Roman Lob Germany returns to a multiartist national final. The songs have been out already awhile and quite interesting selection it is. And most of all it's all open, anything can happen tonight. There is a three-way voting where radio listeners (nine different ones), jury (Anna Loos, Mary Roos, Peter Urban, Roman Lob, Tim Bendzko) and televoters all provide their votes. And among the artists we have everything from Cascada to Gregorian chanting priests, from a Swedish songstress disguised as a German bimbo from the 60's to simil opera.... The show starts at 20.15 and we should have the winner out at 22.15. You can watch it online at eurovision.tv for example. Anke Engelke is presenting and there's pre- and post- shows online, too. This blogger will follow Sanremo's third night though.... Ben Ivory - The righteous ones Betty Diettrich - La la la Blitzkids mvt. - Heart on the line Cascada - G...

Lena's star quality may have come down to dust with her new single called Stardust . It's the title track from her forthcoming third album due to be released in October 2012.  Is it good? Not really, in my books. Instead of being an uplifting sing-a-long I guess it's intended to be it just sounds like she's whining about something.... But that's me. I guess her fans will like it anyways....

The Eurovision winners of the last five editions will all be present and part of the interval act in the second semifinal. That means Marija Serifovic from Serbia, Dima Bilan from Russia, Alexander Rybak from Norway, Lena from Germany and last year's winners on homegrown in Azerbaijan Ell/Nikki will be doing a number together. Now that's what one could call a real class reunion!  Will they sing a medley of their winners or something else? We will see on May 24, 2012. And this is a valid excuse to watch their winning performances once again: 2007 Serbia - Marija Serifovic - Molitva 2008 Russia - Dima Bilan - Believe 2009 Norway - Alexander Rybak - Fairytale 2010 Germany - Lena - Satellite 2011 Azerbaijan - Ell/Nikki - Running scared

The German Eurovision 2012 entrant Roman Lob has released his debut album Changes . A total of 13 tracks, including obviously Standing still (album version). It may be a hard task to follow Lena's footsteps Roman who looks forward for Baku experience with curiosity - and hopes to have some time off to go to the beach, too. He names before mentioned Lena and Lordi as his Eurovision favorites and tells his staging will be simple and fairly straight forward. He fell in love with his entry Standing still , written by Jamie Cullum, the first time he heard it. The song's about a couple who unfortunately split up and the guy has to come to terms with the fact the woman has left him.  This blogger thinks this is one of the most underrated entries this year and is a wonderful little tune that has something special from the first notes that make me always think about Adele for some reason.  Stay tuned for a Roman Lob competition coming up!

This year Jedward returns the year after hoping to make it better than last year's 8th. But what are the odds in Eurovision? We have a recent example of Germany's Lena who returned the year after winning and managed only 10th place. This seems to be the trend anyways if you look the bis makers over the decades.  In the 1950's Germany Margot Hielscher scored 4th and 7th while Italy's Domenico Modugno went from 3rd to 6th, and later returned for the third time - he probably wished he didn't: 17th and zero points!  In the 1960's Norway Nora Brockstedt also did 4th and 7th while United Kingdom's Ronnie Carroll did a solid 4th both times.  The 1970's were the same. Germany's Katja Epstein did twice in a row 3rd place but would later return to claim a 2nd place. That's also an Eurovision record of a kind; three top-3 placements. Sweden's Family Four did 6th and 13th while the Norwegian Bendik Singers did 7th and 14th, the second t...

Belarus is planning big for their Eurofest final. There are only five names left to represant Belarus in Baku 2012 - Alena Lanskaya, Gunesh, Viktoria Aleshko, Litesound and Uzari - but the guest list is impressive: Eurovision 1956 winner Lys Assia , 2004 winner Ruslana , 2007 winner Marija Serifovic , 2009 winner Alexander Rybak , 2010 winner Lena and 2011 winners Ell/Nikki along with Koldun , Belarus best placed artist so far (6th in Helsinki 2007), fan favourite Sakis Rouvas and Switzerland's this year's represant Sinplus . The Eurofest final will be held next week, February 14, 2012.

Last week the elimination continues in Germany's Unser Star für Baku. Leonie Burgmer and Rachel Scharnberg didn't convince the televoters and were kicked out - but you can see it was a very close call as ALL the participants were within 2%.  But it looks like the 21-year-old Roman Lob is attracting the most attention and indeed emerged as the winner of this round after being 2nd in the first show. It is worth mentioning Rachel won her first show and now was left last. Anything can happen! You can watch the performances here . This Thursday another two will leave the show and any hopes of Baku 2012. 11.4% Roman Lob  – Easy 10.3% Céline Huber – How come you don’t call me 10.1% Ornella de Santis – I want you back 10.1% Yana Gercke – Roxanne 09.9% Sebastian Dey – Amnesie 09.8% Shelly Phillips – Fuck you 09.8% Umut Anil – Weitergehen 09.6% Katja Petri – Lego House 09.6% Leonie Burgmer – I love your smile 09.4%  Rachel Scharnberg – Like A Star

The allocation draw has taken place in Buta Palace in Baku. And they are really dragging on "the show". And I sincerely hope these two aren't the hosts for the main events come May! And for sure we did hear Running scared a few times... on the other hand, who has heard it since last May? The Azeris seem to have also major problems with certain flags! Strangely Armenian one is ok though. :-) But the touristic spots of Azerbaijan are beautiful, maybe they are showing it all now as in May the available slots are rather limited these days. And the comments by the youngters on twitter make an old fart like me laugh aloud. How limited the youth of today is? Really??!! I'm ashamed of you.... Total ignorance, zero pantience and respect for other cultures.... And for your information: there's no "audience"; they are the delegations from the 43 countries having a meeting... But now we are having Ruslana on stage (2 hrs to the show). And Aysel. And Alexander Ryb...

One of the highlights of last night's Danish final was Alexander Rybak's violin medley of some Eurovision winning songs, from Fly on the wings of love to  Hold me now to Hard rock hallelujah , from A-ba-ni-bi to Satellite, Fängad av en stormvind to his very own Fairytale . Great stuff! Watch it here .

Germany sticks to the system created by Stefan Raab again to find their entrant for the Eurovision 2012 with minor adjustments. Last night the first show started and five out of 10 artists were dropped while the others move on to the next step. You can watch the performances here (if you don't mind all the advertising before videos). A couple of years ago this brought us Lena with known results - do we have another gem in Germany in the making? Shelly Phillips, Roman Lob, Céline Huber, Leonie Burgmer and Katja Petri qualified while Kai Nötting, Jil Rock, Yasmin Gueroui, Salin Özkan and Jan Verweij have to give up the Eurovision drream. At least for one more year... While Roman Lob is the one making the biggest buzz so far....

BlogIlkar is now proundy joined in EFR12 radio network. If you want to listen to Eurovision entries, songs by Eurovision artists, national selection songs and Eurovision covers, tune in. I have been listening today all day and heard so many songs I like and haven't heard for a long time. A pure entertainment and walking down the memory line. Tune is from the link on right corner of this blog. In their homepage also information on special days they have like recently featured Dima Bilan and Lena. All Eurovision stars on this radio! Ecoutez!

Lena's success story continues as she is the European nominee for the MTV Europe's Wordwide act. The others besides Lena are Britney Spears (North America), BIGBANG (Asia Pacific), Abdelfattah Grini (Africa/India/Middle East) and Restart (Latin America). The Finnish act is Lauri this year. And like every year I can only wonder why they bother with these awards if some 90% of the acts are non-European? So, let's all unite and vote for Lena who is both European and Eurovision! Ok? Here . One click is enough. This year the awards are givenin Belfast on November 8, 2011 hosted by very European Selena Gomes. Not. Helsinki has applied for the 2012 edition btw.

Vittoria Hyde, a self proclaimed European alien, who has already secured her place in the Swiss Italian semifinal next month with It's your love . She's also in the running in the German part. In this exclusive interview she tells us the story behind last year's Play the trumpet . Why she was eliminated from X Factor? And she talks about Matia Bazar and Celine Dion. And what would take her to the Sanremo festival? Bella, bionda, alta e magra – what else is Vittoria Hyde? An alien! Hahaha. A singer , a fashion blogger and shortly a Dj and VJ. I'm hungry and foolish. Last year your Play the trumpet was my favourite song of all national finals of the season. The all of sudden you were disqualified, what happened? Were you incazzata ? I was very very sad and incazzata of course. To present myself I have uploaded 30 seconds of the idea of the song, it was only lalala, to the Benetton website "It's my time". This short video was also on my Faceb...

United Kingdom didn't have a national selection of any kind for the first time in history and send Blue with I can instead. It all promised well and sounded great on paper but fell flat on stage unfortunately.  Germany did have a selection where the reigning Eurovision queen sung all the songs. Uptempo and rather hypnotic Taken by a stranger won and got the home audience wild, Europe wasn't that impressed. What if she sung Push forward instead, the runner up? A ballad? Hard to say but maybe she would have been in top-10 with this one, too, but not any higher. Or?