Liverpool and the rest of the world – Kommersant

The 67th Eurovision Song Contest will begin on May 9 in Liverpool. On this day, the first semi-final will be held in the British city, the second will be held on May 11, and the winner will be known on May 13. About the competition, which is unusual in many respects, tells Igor Gavrilov.

Eurovision 2023 is the first European song contest since 1980 not to be hosted by the previous winner. The decision of the European Broadcasting Union not to hold the 2023 contest in Ukraine, which won it in 2022, is due to the ongoing military conflict in the country. The UK will host the contest, according to the official wording, “on behalf of Ukraine.” The Kingdom got this opportunity, as its representative Sam Ryder was in 2nd place in the 2022 competition.

During the discussion of the candidates of cities capable of hosting the competition, Glasgow and Liverpool took the lead. Scotland has repeatedly stated its desire to participate in the competition separately from the London delegation, but it has never succeeded. The prospect of bringing the competition to the country for the first time was intriguing, but Glasgow eventually lost the fight for this right to The Beatles’ hometown. Competitive shows will be held at Liverpool’s M&S Bank Arena, which seats 11,000 spectators.

It was logical to expect that the living members of the legendary Liverpool Four Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr would participate in the opening ceremony of the contest or any other Eurovision events. However, the possible presence of the Beatles theme in the scripts of the show is not commented on in any way.

But it is known that the hosts of the three competition evenings will be the British singer and TV presenter Alisha Dixon, her Ukrainian colleague, the lead singer of The Hardkiss group Yulia Sanina and actress Hannah Waddingham, the star of the West End and TV series Game of Thrones and Ted Lasso. On the final evening they will be joined by longtime Eurovision commentator Graham Norton. The stage presence will be preceded by a greeting from Spice Girls member Melanie Chisholm, aka Mel C: she’s from the area, born in the village of Whiston near Liverpool.

Yuliya Sanina will open the competition with two songs: “Lighthouse” by The Hardkiss and “Together in Electric Dreams” by Phil Oakey and Giorgio Moroder. Last year’s victors Kalush Orchestra will sing the winning song “Stephania” at the beginning of the final evening of the competition. Ukrainian participants of previous competitions will also perform – Go_A, Tina Karol, Jamala and Verka Serdyuchka. It is also worth noting that the Ukrainian composer Dmitry Shurov, a former member of Okean Elzy and Zemfira’s accompanying cast (recognized as a foreign agent in Russia), wrote the music for the “video postcards” that precede the performances of participants from different countries.

It is expected that the competition will be watched live by 160 million viewers. According to the forecasts of bookmakers, which are often close to the truth, the Swedish singer Loreen, who has already won the contest once, has the best chance of winning. Lorin (full name – Lorin Zineb Nora Talaui) will perform the song “Tattoo” at Eurovision. Experienced Swedish producers, who have been supplying Europe with songs for Eurovision for many years, made a number for their compatriot absolutely according to the patterns of her own “Euphoria”, which won in 2012: epic pop with a touch of opera and afrobeat, poems about love and video without a gram of irony . The chances that it will work are 39%. A Finnish singer named Kääriya has a 24% chance of winning with “Cha Cha Cha” in the vein of Little Big. They are followed by France, Ukraine, Spain and other countries by a wide margin. Montenegro, Bulgaria and North Macedonia are not participating this year due to financial reasons.

Russia last sent its participant to Eurovision in 2021. Then the country was represented by Manizha. On February 25, 2022, the European Broadcasting Union disqualified Russia, and the next day, domestic TV channels withdrew from its membership. Theoretically, Russians can still influence the outcome of the vote by casting their votes together with residents of other non-participating countries as “the rest of the world.” The “rest of the world” will vote as one country. In order to feel their involvement in the decision, Russian Eurovision fans will need a valid card from one of the international payment systems. True, the list of countries in which this procedure will be available has not yet been officially published.