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Kuwait Times, Kuwait
May 27 2012
Sweden sweeps Azerbaijan's contentious Eurovision
Swedish star Loreen yesterday celebrated victory over rivals including
Russian pensioners in a spectacular Eurovision Song Contest that host
Azerbaijan hoped would banish qualms over its rights record. Loreen,
28, the daughter of Berber immigrants from Morocco, wowed voters with
a catchy dance number called `Euphoria' featuring an exultant chorus
accompanied by a high-kicking dance duet and a storm of artificial
snow. The slick four-hour show late Saturday was the biggest event
ever hosted by energy-rich Azerbaijan as it seeks to present a glitzy
image despite concerns over rights violations under the autocratic
rule of the Aliyev dynasty.
Loreen's victory was the fifth by Sweden in the contest and followed
in the footsteps of its most famous band Abba who won the contest in
1974 with `Waterloo'-for many the song that defined the kitschy
contest for all time. `It's just a question of taste. This year it
happened to me,' was how Loreen, whose real name is Lorine Zineb Noka
Talhaoui, modestly explained her victory. Swedish Foreign Minister
Carl Bildt tweeted: `Yes, Loreen certainly lived up to high
expectations.' Second place on Saturday went to Russia's heartwarming
Buranovskiye Babushki, a choir of elderly village women aged up to 76
who performed a disco song `Party for Everybody' in English and their
local Finno-Ugric language.
`There are tears of joy. The Babushki are so happy with their
success,' band administrator Maria Tolstukhina told Interfax, adding
their earnings would be spent on building a new church in their native
village of Buranovo. Third was Serbian Eurovision veteran Zelijko
Joksimovic who had already competed in three previous contests, once
as a singer and twice as a composer. The show included the usual range
of the weird and exotic including a Norwegian rapper of Iranian origin
who came last, half-naked French gymnasts and Irish duo Jedward who
ended the routine by getting drenched by a fountain. There was
disappointment for Britain after veteran crooner Engelbert
Humperdinck-brought in to revive its notoriously bad Eurovision
fortunes-scored just 12 points and came second last with his ballad
`Love Will Set You Free'.
Sweden's victory with 372 points with an uplifting song tailor made
for the contest was never in doubt, although voting was marked by the
usual backslapping patterns with the Greeks voting for the Cypriots
and vice versa. The final's 26 acts lit up the spectacular Crystal
Hall built to host the contest in barely half a year on the Caspian
Sea, with an audience of some 20,000 inside the venue and 100 million
television viewers. The host entry Sabina Babayeva was not all that
far from securing a repeat of Azerbaijan's 2011 success that earned
the nation the right to host the contest with her `When the Music
Dies' coming in fourth.
Loreen ran into controversy during the contest by meeting local rights
activists who briefed her on the lack of democratic freedoms in the
tightly controlled ex-Soviet state. However at the post-contest news
conference she sidestepped a question about how she would support the
people of Azerbaijan further, saying simply that: `I will support the
Azerbaijan people from my heart.' In Baku the festive atmosphere had
been clouded by the detentions of dozens of opposition activists who
attempted to hold several peaceful demonstrations calling for
democratic freedoms in the tightly-controlled state.
Azerbaijan is run by strongman President Ilham Aliyev, who succeeded
his late father Heidar Aliyev in 2003. His wife Mehriban Aliyeva
headed the organising committee of Eurovision and his son-in-law, Emin
Agalarov, a Moscow-based businessman with a budding pop career, sang
in a black leather jacket in a musical interlude after the voting. The
event was also far beyond the reach of ordinary Azerbaijanis, with
tickets for the final starting at 160 manat ($204), half the monthly
income of the average Azeri, according to World Bank statistics. With
political sensitivities never far from this Eurovision, the
promotional videos shown included landscapes from Nagorny Karabakh,
which Armenian separatists backed by Yerevan seized from Azerbaijan in
a war in the 1990s. Armenia had pulled out of the contest saying it
feared hostile treatment and Azerbaijan barred those who had visited
Nagorny Karabakh from travelling to the contest. - AFP
http://news.kuwaittimes.net/2012/05/27/sweden-sweeps-azerbaijans-contentious-eurovision/
May 27 2012
Sweden sweeps Azerbaijan's contentious Eurovision
Swedish star Loreen yesterday celebrated victory over rivals including
Russian pensioners in a spectacular Eurovision Song Contest that host
Azerbaijan hoped would banish qualms over its rights record. Loreen,
28, the daughter of Berber immigrants from Morocco, wowed voters with
a catchy dance number called `Euphoria' featuring an exultant chorus
accompanied by a high-kicking dance duet and a storm of artificial
snow. The slick four-hour show late Saturday was the biggest event
ever hosted by energy-rich Azerbaijan as it seeks to present a glitzy
image despite concerns over rights violations under the autocratic
rule of the Aliyev dynasty.
Loreen's victory was the fifth by Sweden in the contest and followed
in the footsteps of its most famous band Abba who won the contest in
1974 with `Waterloo'-for many the song that defined the kitschy
contest for all time. `It's just a question of taste. This year it
happened to me,' was how Loreen, whose real name is Lorine Zineb Noka
Talhaoui, modestly explained her victory. Swedish Foreign Minister
Carl Bildt tweeted: `Yes, Loreen certainly lived up to high
expectations.' Second place on Saturday went to Russia's heartwarming
Buranovskiye Babushki, a choir of elderly village women aged up to 76
who performed a disco song `Party for Everybody' in English and their
local Finno-Ugric language.
`There are tears of joy. The Babushki are so happy with their
success,' band administrator Maria Tolstukhina told Interfax, adding
their earnings would be spent on building a new church in their native
village of Buranovo. Third was Serbian Eurovision veteran Zelijko
Joksimovic who had already competed in three previous contests, once
as a singer and twice as a composer. The show included the usual range
of the weird and exotic including a Norwegian rapper of Iranian origin
who came last, half-naked French gymnasts and Irish duo Jedward who
ended the routine by getting drenched by a fountain. There was
disappointment for Britain after veteran crooner Engelbert
Humperdinck-brought in to revive its notoriously bad Eurovision
fortunes-scored just 12 points and came second last with his ballad
`Love Will Set You Free'.
Sweden's victory with 372 points with an uplifting song tailor made
for the contest was never in doubt, although voting was marked by the
usual backslapping patterns with the Greeks voting for the Cypriots
and vice versa. The final's 26 acts lit up the spectacular Crystal
Hall built to host the contest in barely half a year on the Caspian
Sea, with an audience of some 20,000 inside the venue and 100 million
television viewers. The host entry Sabina Babayeva was not all that
far from securing a repeat of Azerbaijan's 2011 success that earned
the nation the right to host the contest with her `When the Music
Dies' coming in fourth.
Loreen ran into controversy during the contest by meeting local rights
activists who briefed her on the lack of democratic freedoms in the
tightly controlled ex-Soviet state. However at the post-contest news
conference she sidestepped a question about how she would support the
people of Azerbaijan further, saying simply that: `I will support the
Azerbaijan people from my heart.' In Baku the festive atmosphere had
been clouded by the detentions of dozens of opposition activists who
attempted to hold several peaceful demonstrations calling for
democratic freedoms in the tightly-controlled state.
Azerbaijan is run by strongman President Ilham Aliyev, who succeeded
his late father Heidar Aliyev in 2003. His wife Mehriban Aliyeva
headed the organising committee of Eurovision and his son-in-law, Emin
Agalarov, a Moscow-based businessman with a budding pop career, sang
in a black leather jacket in a musical interlude after the voting. The
event was also far beyond the reach of ordinary Azerbaijanis, with
tickets for the final starting at 160 manat ($204), half the monthly
income of the average Azeri, according to World Bank statistics. With
political sensitivities never far from this Eurovision, the
promotional videos shown included landscapes from Nagorny Karabakh,
which Armenian separatists backed by Yerevan seized from Azerbaijan in
a war in the 1990s. Armenia had pulled out of the contest saying it
feared hostile treatment and Azerbaijan barred those who had visited
Nagorny Karabakh from travelling to the contest. - AFP
http://news.kuwaittimes.net/2012/05/27/sweden-sweeps-azerbaijans-contentious-eurovision/