Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

  Princess Stéphanie of Monaco, the collest princess ever! Surely she's got an colorful life from running away with a circyus, marrying her bodyguard, being a model and designer and on the other hand losing her mother in a car accident that some say she was driving.... All this put aside, she also was a singer for a period. Her debut Ouragan might have been a Jeanne Mas reject but it was a huge hit anyways. A few followed, both in French and in English. 

Hanna Pakarinen is releasing her new album Synnyin elän kuolen (I was born I live I die) next September 9 and it's a cover album of late Carola's songs (not the Swedish one but the Finnish one). Carola scored hits also with covers back in the day and one of the biggest ones was the Eurovision 1971 winner Un banc, un armbre, une rue for Monaco and it is the second single off the album, titled in Finnish  Penkki, puu ja puistotie . The first single was Herrojen kanssa pellonlaidassa . But before that her fans have a chance to relisten all the songs she has ever recorded solo (with the new album they are already 77) live on webstream and Periscope on her Facebook page every Tuesday. All new acoustic live versions with guitarist Jaakko Kääriäinen. 

April 3, 1971 Dublin's Gaiety Theater hosted the 16th Eurovision song contest. 18 countries were taking part when Austria, Finland, Norway, Portugal and Sweden returned from their protest withdrawel the year before, and Malta debuted. That year's new thing was the previews; each country was required to show them. Belgium had a lot of drama when singer Nicole of Nicole & Hugo fell ill days before the final and were quickly replaced by Lily Castel & Jacques Raymond - something that is strictly forbidden in the rules these days. I guess today the artist would be just drugged enough to go and try to sing for 3 minutes and that's it. Kortisone shots anyone? Monaco scored their first and only win - and declined to host the year after - with a 100% French act. Séverine even claims she never set foot in Monaco, but that's not quite true. Her winning entry is a real evergreen. Séverine covered it in four languages and it was covered in many other languages, the Fin...

Today's news is that San Marino (and also Albania ) has indeed applied for the Eurovision song contest 2016 in Stockholm. In San Marino's case the Head of delegation Alessandro Capicchioni told in an interview with Eurofestival News that they have applied but nothing is confirmed yet. They are looking into various options what comes to sponsors and producer and the offers they are getting. As always in their case the choice is purely internal. Time will tell if there will be a change for their seventh participation after four years with Ralph Siegel productions.... All will be settled and decided over the next few weeks (the EBU deadline to confirm seems to be on October 10, 2015) but their participation should be rather secure now. But the most interesting thing comes in the end of the interview when he says San Marino is feeling a bit lonely as the only microstate participant and he'd love to see Andorra and Monaco back in game. And he says he has a feeling that...

Italian Eurovision entrants and Sanremo 2013 winner Marco Mengoni has picked up five nominations in the World Music Awards, the ones held in Monte Carlo with Prince Albert . Mengoni is nominated as the best male artist, live act and entertainer of the year and L'Essenziale as the best song, #prontoacorrere as the best album. You can vote here (max 5 times a day, so it's easy; 5 votes, 5 nominations) Other Eurovision related nominees are Euphoria as the best song, Céline Dion as the best female artist and live act, Dima Bilan and Emin both as the beest male artist, live act and entertainer of the year and Loreen as the female artist.

The lights have hardly been turned off in Crystal Hall when the first announcements of those who will be in Sweden 2013 are coming in.  Armenia  in the front line. But also Belarus and Albania didn't waste time to say yes and also Hungary, Austria, the Netherlands, Finland, Norway, Denmark, Germany, Estonia, Switzerland, Ireland, Bulgaria, France, Romania and Spain are going to be back. Let's see if Sweden and EBU's new plans of a shorter and smaller scale Eurovision will attract the missing children of Andorra, Czech Republic, Monaco and Poland back and keep the others participating, most of all San Marino, Slovakia and Italy. And will Kazakhstan and/or Liechtenstein make their debut?

You were expecting this, weren't you? After their Kuunkuiskaajat parody Työlki ellää that was loved by the girls themselves and half of Finland along with Europe they did Eric Saade's Popular last year (no information on what he thought about it) this time they have done the video for the Udmurt grannies Buranovskiye Babushki song  Party for everybody . It's the promo video the grannies themselves never did, bringing the song to another level, so to speak. Once again fabulous job and pure entertainment! With an important message. Well done, Dekel, Bastien and your co-grannies and extras! (And on a such wonderful spring day we have in Finland today you may want to enjoy this old gem of theirs, too.)

Pyhä Unplugged has become a very popular music event since it's debut in 1998. Over the years dozens of front line artists have performed their own songs and covers with the Pyhä houseband SYY. Now for the first time they will also release an album due September 14. Amongst the artists we have Paula Koivuniemi, Irina, Laura Voutilainen-Pave Maijanen duo and Hanna Pakarinen. And the good news is one of the two songs Hanna has recorded for the album is none other than Penkki, puu ja puistotie aka Un banc, un ambre, une rue or the Eurovision 1971 winner for Monaco.

Another French speaking little one, Monaco, took part from 1959 to 1979 and returned in 2004. Three years stopped in the semifinals made them lose their interest at least for now. They blame Monaco has no chance to qualify with the current voting system where neighbouring voting counts too much (how about sending good songs and valuable artists, they would have an endless resources of big French stars?) as well as financial matters. TMC has however went on year by year toying with the participation so there is a chance we will see them back. 24 entries to date with one victory in 1971 - Monaco remains the only winning country that did not host the Eurovision - and 7 other top-5 placings gives a very good average, however the placements in the 2000's are sad reading: 19th, 24th and 21st in semifinal. Just like Luxembourg also Monaco usually borrowed its song writers and artists from France or elsewhere, and sometimes managed to get a big name for them like Francoise Hardy , or the ...

One of the three European lilliputs has finally confirmed a NO for "financial reasons" or rather a lack of a sponsor. TMC would participate if the government gave them funds as it did in 2004-2006 when Monaco returned from its long absense. Apparently Prince Albert himself was behind the comeback in 2004. And that's a good enough excuse to enjoy some fabulous music from Princess Stéphanie: Ouragan written by Romano Musumarra and rejected by Jeanne Mas , Winds of change , Flash , I'm waiting for you - shame she didn't do the horors back then! Liechtenstein and Luxembourg are still in the running for a debut and a comeback.

Gaiety Theater in Dublin hosted the 16th Eurovision on April 3, 1971. All the countries that stayed home in 1970 for protest returned, as well as Austria and Malta debuted. Besides the voting there were also other new things: the preview videos were obligatory to all countries and groups/bands were allowed for the first time, too, but only Sweden and Switzerland sent a group. The Swiss one was Peter, Sue and Marc and they would also make another record in Eurovision history: they would participate in all 4 times, singing in a different language every time: 1971 in French, 1976 in English, 1979 in German and finally in 1981 in Italian. Apparently also another record was made that night: Séverine did not sing her winning entry again in the end but a recorded version was seen on TV - and even that cut short. Another oddity was that Séverine, represanting Monaco, had never set her foot in Monaco before the contest, nor was she ever invited there after her victory... and as we know the Eur...