Eurovision: American Idol's exotic cousin

Last Saturday as Jose and I were flipping through the channels we came across the Eurovision song competition. I couldn't believe that Jose had kept such a gem of a show from me. After watching for 5 minutes, I was hooked. In this song competition, 24 countries across Europe send a singer or group to perform one song either in their native language or more often than not in English (since commercially this is more attractive). When all the singers have finished, voting opens up for about 15 minutes and the audience (there are no judges) can call in or text to vote for their favorite. You cannot, however, vote for the performance from your own country. After the voting ends, the 42 countries that participate (though not all perform) give their top choices points. It is interesting because neighboring and friendly countries usually give higher scores to one another. In the end, a winner is crowned and that song tends to become a hit right away.



This year the competition was held in Azerbaijan (the country whose song won last year-see map above). We did not catch the first half of the show so I based my favorites on the performances we saw. Though I am somewhat partial, I did think that Spain had a good song that was sung in Spanish (they came in 10th place). My favorite was the Serbian song which I thought was really beautiful and was sung in the country's native language. The last performance was also very interesting. It was from Moldova and featured an artist that looked a lot like a swarthier version of my all-time FAVORITE actor Edward Norton (who needs to make more movies ASAP). This performance also had these weird dancers and a rhythm I can only assume was Molvodonian (not sure if that word exists).


Anyway, the song that ended up winning by a lot was from Sweden. We missed the original presentation but did see it again at the end of the show and it was really catchy.

To sum up Eurovision is better than American Idol because:

-It only lasts one night and a few hours. You don't have to tune in week after week.

-You don't have to suffer through awful audition shows. Each country elects their own singer and song to send.

-The host was not Ryan Seacrest.

-There were no judges giving stupid feedback.

-You got the results almost instantaneously.

-The quality of original songs was very good.

I used to be a fan of American Idol when I was in high school and it was still relatively new. Now I am definitely a convert to Eurovision and cannot wait for next year's show. I think I will make a whole thing of it complete with a sheet to make comments about the songs, rankings, etc. It is going to be payback for all the soccer games I have watched. Sorry Jose.

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