Hello Europe and the world,

in the night of Saturday, May 13th the Grand Final of the 67th Eurovision Song Contest took part in Liverpool, UK on behalf of the actual winning country Ukraine. Read a review in the following.

The Armenian delicacy Dolma for dinner, a birthday cake for the 14th, oh, and then there is Eurovision – while the average person is making a countdown by time and numbers (hours/minutes/seconds…) I made my countdown to Eurovision throughout the whole day along my to-dos. It was though and I was really beaten but at least I did it and unlike during the semi-final 2, about which you can read here, I could enjoy the show without anything around – well, the Grand Final lasted long enough – in the following you can read my impressions.

Eurovision Song Contest 2023: Ukrainian-British Partnership

While my first impression within the bounds of the semi-finals was that it is the United Kingdom rather than the Ukraine hosting the Eurovision Song Contest as proud winner I had to revise my judgement and recognize the United Kingdom hosting the Eurovision Song Contest on behalf of Ukraine as equal partners like a “happily ever after” by the Grand Final. The impression of the United Kingdom taking over Ukraine as host of the Eurovision Song Contest 2023 arose from my personal point-of-view for the following factors:

First of all I felt of last year’s winner Ukraine (aggressively said) being undermined in their deserved Eurovision (regardless from the circumstances in their country) from the arrangement of the hosts. There was only one Ukrainian Julia Sanina but on total three British hosts. This, of course, made the small Sanina (1,64m/5’4ft) look even more like a sublime, proud, tall and strong warrior lady on stage as I already mentioned on behalf of the semi-final 1, which you can read here but still it felt like she needed to scream louder in order to establish the Ukrainian part Eurovision 2023. In the end I concluded that the dress code following the colours of the Ukrainian flag (yellow and blue) along with the strong bond and big love the three female hosts shared showed the effort to actually adapt to the Ukrainian national and cultural traits miles away in Liverpool.

Anther point have been the interval acts such as Rita Ora and on the whole rather British celebrities taking over the Eurovision Song Contest also during the opening ceremonies. I would have wished it to be all Ukrainian artists but in the end I understand that The more I loved the opening ceremony of the grand final where exclusively former Ukrainian representatives such as Go_A, Tina Karol or Verka Sedruchka performed. Finally as well the winning song “Stefania” by the Kalush Orchestra was performed not only by them but beyond the walls of the Eurovision hall in Liverpool by Sam Ryder and as biggest surprise Princess Catherine of Wales, who also followed the Ukrainian blue dress code, on piano in her chambers. There is one more point to which however I am going to refer in a separate last paragraph.

Why the United Kingdom?

Probably everyone of us has wondered about this question with justification as there have been enough other applications to organize Eurovision 2023 on behalf of Ukraine. The most legit reason is probably to have chosen the vice-winner of last year’s contest who was the representative of the United Kingdom: Sam Ryder with “Space Man” who was shining in Italy. Personally I hope and believe that this contest having taken part in England could strengthen the unity between Europe and the United Kingdom after the Brexit (the decision by the citizens of the United Kingdom to separate from Europe politically as the result of the flood of refugees since 2015)

Eurovision Song Contest 2023: Big Five

In the two semi finals teasers of the performances to come were shown and the big five introduced. During the grand final it was on the big five containing the five founding-countries France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Spain as well as the host Ukraine (making them big six alternatively from time to time). In the following I am going to add my impressions of their performances according to their running number:

1. (06) France — La Zarra “Évidemment“: La Zarra is a grande dame you wish a classy French representative to be: celebrating herself proudly very big and very high with a whole lot of style in black, glitter and very alluding red lips according to the motto: plus est plus. As she was named in one sentence with Barbara Pravi who succeeded as second two years ago it could be thought that French classic (even though modernized would gain popularity – at least it does for me). But we will see in the following how it actually went.
2. (08) Spain — Blanca Paloma “Eaea“: The second Blanca of the show. With her clean, beautiful singing she presented a dramatic yet passionate Flamenco in bloody deep red, smoothed with white on bottom. The singer has a beautiful, melodic and light voice. As it has been said Paloma was inspired by Rosalia — the best export of Spain, who also reminds me of my daughter as she is the most famous Rosalia known. The song itself rather reminded me of the style of the Albanian entry. It was not necessarily what I was expecting. I was missing some sort of spice or character in the song.
3. (11) Italy — Marco Mengoni “Due Vite”: A reunion with Marco Mengoni after 2020. What was noticible right away was his glitter outfit like his fellow Italian representatives last year. Unlike his first performance seven years ago his song this time was faster, had more character and also his staging was refined with the background dancers. On the whole it was a beautiful song and it was good that he sang in his native language or rather the language of the country he represented — but otherwise everything sounds good in Italian.
4. (19) Ukraine — Tvorchi “Heart Of Steel“: The Ukrainian men in black with amazing outfits(!) — I love the silver coat! The duo delivered a very cool and modern R&B-song. Even cooler was staging in yellow and blue, the colors of the Ukrainian flag. The song contained a dramatic organ and a perfect duo using their native language at parts.
5. (21) Germany — Lord Of The Lost “Blood & Glitter“: There is certainly a group of people who is completely into the style of Lord Of The Lost – if this includes Eurovision-enthusiasts I dare to doubt. Already during the pre-selection I was wondering with shock why and how in the world LOTL (or how they are satirically called in German media: Lord Of The Last) could be chosen, but let that be another topic – having watched the countdown to Eurovision 2023 on German television I learned that the actual winner forgot her lyrics during her final performance and shamefully failed. I do not actually believe that LOTL have been the worst entry Eurovision history has ever seen having the Finnish band Lordi with their winning song “Hardrock Halleluja” in mind but I do felt of them to be rather scary especially with the very aggressive red and the word “blood” included in the title of the song. It is in fact a controversial entry.
6. (26) United Kingdom — Mae Muller “I Wrote A Song“: Oh she is really beautiful(!) especially with sexy silhouette and amazing blue eyes. Her impressive voice, cool and modern stage as well as performance and song topped her natural beauty. Mae is an independent young woman with a powerful, beautiful voice, who has a lot of sympathy and is very genius also from text of the song she wrote which was lively yet with class on the whole picture. If you want to understand what I mean see her whole lyrics here.

Eurovision Song Contest 2023: Personal Ranking

Since I have put personal impressions about all songs participating in the Eurovision Song Contest 2023 into words in the following you will find my personal ranking for the grand final below. As every year those ranked better than actually are marked green and those ranked worse red:

1. Estonia
2. Finland
3. Czechia
4. Austria
5. Ukraine
6. Switzerland
7. Slovenia
8. France
9. Portugal
10. Norway
11. Serbia
12. Albania
13. Armenia
14. Poland
15. Italy
16. Israel
17. United Kingdom
18. Cyprus
19. Belgium
20. Germany
21. Australia
22. Moldova
23. Lithuania
24. Spain
25. Sweden
26. Croatia

As you can (almost) clearly see my personal ranking completely differs from the actual ranking – in this case it would not have mattered that the actual jury-votes and the public-votes also clearly contradicted each other. I was surprised myself about my final ranking because it is does not mirror how often I listen to the songs or how much I like them (at least not in the first place) rather my ranking is based on originality of the song, uniqueness and the performance the impressions they left on me from breath-taking to simply beautiful. Personally, I would have not minded Finland as runner-up with a very conspicuous and unique representative such as Käärijä hato win the contest (which would have followed the pattern of winners basically thinking of the years 2007 with Verka Serduchka as winner, 2014 with Conchita Wurst or 2017 with Netta.

The Sweden-Issue

Sweden and Loreen – you can either love them or hate them. I, myself, do not hate Loreen nor do I hate Sweden but I must admit that after three victories in the passed eleven years I have grown tired of the unnecessary hype. Last but not least I am sorry for all the nations along with their representatives who try and work hard year by year to bring the Eurovision Song Contest home and do not succeed because of a monotone mindset. I would rather wish for more independence and less influences in the votes and probably more diversity. If you want to reread my impressions of Loreen’s performane check my previous article about the semi-final one here.

“The Eurovision Song Contest is political!”

A leaving would not be worthy if it did not leave its traces such as that of the German spokesman for the Eurovision Song Contest, Peter Urban, who said exactly this sentence at the end of his presentation. But let us, just for a minute, not freak out about this claim but accept it with honor and be honest: A winning song about 1944 in 2016, women’s rights in 2021 and 2023, feminism, LGBTQI+, Armenia skipping its participation for the Eurovision Song Contest in Baku, Russia disqualified from the contest in 2017 and this year and (both times Ukraine the host or rather winning country in the year before), a Palestine flag in Israel, the memorial on Ternopil in Liverpool… the list is long nonetheless last but not least I want to name two more things: the jury votes and the German representatives as only ones who did not raise their national flag during the opening show of this year’s Grand Final (you can see it in the embedded video below in minute 12:01). After all we have to accept that these artists representing their countries are not only mannequins with a voice but humans with a brain, a point-of-view and something in their heart and perhaps this is their place to raise a voice or put a sign to the world when media focuses on only one issue out of political interest and influence into a certain direction. Why should one thing be allowed and the next thing be punished? It is time for changes and progress. Neither it is a shame to accept the Eurovision Song Contest to be political not it would not be a shame for Germans to raise a flag and get over their past.

Finally I am hoping for the best for Peter Urban and Barbara Schöneberger (spokeswoman for the jury points) and am looking forward to fresh new faces.

https://youtu.be/Yf8ESDEnN10?list=RDYf8ESDEnN10

Love, Johanna