Uniting a continent through wacky song
Saturday, May 14,
2011
Guelph Mercury- Jack
Ewing
Fri May 13Uniting a
continent through wacky song
DUESSELDORF, GERMANY – When the Armenian singer known as Emmy appeared
onstage sitting in an oversize boxing glove Tuesday night, European viewers
knew that at least one performer was upholding the traditions that the
Eurovision Song Contest is known for: an over-the-top stage performance and a
forgettable tune sung in questionable English.
Eurovision, a Continental battle of the bands that has been building to a
climax this week with live televised semifinals, is often dismissed as tacky,
politicized and rarely capable of producing durable stars. Yet this wildly
popular song contest may also be just the thing that Europe needs right now.
Since 1956, Eurovision has been one of the few cultural institutions that
bind citizens of Europe together, proponents say, an urgently needed common
denominator at a time when European solidarity is under strain. If the past is
any guide, the final on Saturday will draw well over 100 million viewers.
`Critics claim that the European Union lacks legitimacy because people don’t
identify with it,’ said Milija Gluhovic, an assistant professor of theatre at
Warwick University in Britain, and a scholar of Eurovision. (Yes, there is such
a thing as a scholar of Eurovision.) `There is something to be said for the
ways in which the contest may be engendering a way of identifying with this
larger supra-nation, Europe.’
Gluhovic is among a growing number of scholars treating Eurovision as a
subject for research. `There are not too many events doing this kind of
cultural work,’ he said.
Europe, as defined by Eurovision, extends as far west as Iceland, as far
south as Israel and as far east as Azerbaijan. Yet, in what could be a
reflection of the mood of austerity and fiscal gloom hanging over Europe, some
connoisseurs of the event have detected an unsettling trend in this year’s
entries.
The campiness that has won the event a global cult following – especially
among some gay viewers, researchers say – seems muted this year. The Eastern
European countries, which normally set the standard for bizarre combinations of
folk culture and Vegas glitter, are going easy on the sequins.
`Even the Azerbaijanis’ stage show is down to earth,’ said Liza Petersen, a
Danish fan and blogger who earns her living as a bookkeeper in Copenhagen.
Petersen spends much of the year travelling to Eurovision fan events and
preliminary national contests. She was dressed in sequined hot pants and a
matching hat on Tuesday for the first round of Eurovision semifinals.
Socializing with other bloggers at the vast Eurovision press centre adjacent
to the concert arena here, Petersen noted that performers from Belarus and
Ukraine had not yet taken the stage.
They `usually do the whole shebang,’ she said, but added that a greater
focus on the music might be good. `It is tremendous how much money they spend,’
she said. `Sometimes I think they should spend it on their own people.’
Indeed, some Eastern European countries, which began competing after the
1991 breakup of the Soviet Union, have made winning a national mission.
According to an account on ESC Insight, a Web publication that follows the
contest, after Estonia’s victory in 2001, the nation’s prime minister, Mart
Laar, told flag-waving throngs in Tallinn: `We freed ourselves from the Soviet
Empire through song. Now we will sing our way into Europe!’ Karen Fricker, a
lecturer in contemporary theater at Royal Holloway, University of London, said,
`They seized an opportunity to show that they were a part of Europe.’ Fricker,
originally from California, is a founder of the Eurovision Research Network,
which planned several academic workshops in Duesseldorf in the days leading up
to the final.
But many Western Europeans also savour the event. Spectators arriving by the
busload Tuesday night often carried flags and wore face paint in their national
colors. There is also an economic payoff for winning. The defending champion
gets to play host to the following year’s contest, which draws thousands of
visitors. Hard-pressed Ireland, represented this year by identical twins with
big hair known as Jedward, is given a fair chance of taking home the tourist
bonanza.
Not everyone was a model of tastefulness this year.
Daria, from Croatia, managed a costume change midsong, with the help of an
onstage magician who briefly shrouded her in a curtain.
`It’s still Eurovision; it’s still all about the costumes,’ said Alexander
Rybak, who won for Norway in 2009 with the song Fairytale and is here
reporting on the event for Norwegian television.
Daria, however, did not advance to the final, nor did Emmy, the Armenian
with the giant boxing glove.
The contest also brought a hint of political controversy. Anastasiya
Vinnikova, the 21-year-old Belarussian contestant, selected as her entry a song
called I Love Belarus. Some commentators have criticized the choice,
coming just months after a brutal crackdown on opposition politicians and
journalists by the Belarussian president, Aleksandr G. Lukashenko.
`I’m free, friendly and young,’ Vinnikova sings in a video released before
the contest that intersperses shots of her vamping seductively with folk
dancers twirling in native costume. She also did not advance to the final.
To be sure, the contest has some elements that seem typical of politics in
the European Union, widely criticized for its byzantine decision-making process
that produces mediocre results. The winner of Eurovision is chosen by a
combination of professional jurors and telephone voting by viewers. Jurors and
viewers cannot vote for their own countries, so they tend instead to choose
their neighbours.
That has led to charges of collusion, as when Serbia won in 2007 with help
from Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia. But Gluhovic, who is from Sarajevo,
said voting patterns reflected cultural similarities rather than deliberate
manipulation.
`You had the Balkan wars in the ’90s, former Yugoslavia in flames, but then
after fighting each other, these nations gave each other big scores,’ he said.
`When I saw that, I was really moved.’
Detractors point to the event’s negligible record of producing international
superstars. With a few exceptions, like ABBA, which won for Sweden in 1974 with
the song Waterloo, and Celine Dion, who won for Switzerland in 1988 with
Ne partez pas sans moi, fame for most contestants has proved fleeting.
Who outside of Spain remembers Massiel, the Spanish singer who won in 1968
(reportedly with the help of some jury vote-buying by Francisco Franco)? That
year’s runner-up, Cliff Richards of Britain, proved to be the more durable
performer.
Still, the contest allows small or emerging countries, like Malta and
Albania, to show that, yes, they, too, have something resembling a pop music
scene.
Rybak, 25, who plays the violin and sings, conceded that he had not become
terribly popular throughout Western Europe since his Eurovision triumph. He
hasn’t even tried to crack the United States, he said.
But Rybak, who was born in Belarus and speaks Russian, said he was content
being a star in Russia and in Europe’s smaller pop markets. `Every time I come
to Greece,’ he said, `it feels like I won Eurovision all over again.’
New York Times news service