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Please enjoy my first Eurovision review of the new year! I wonder how far I’ll get when the 2024 contest happens? I don’t think I’ll catch up, but maybe I’ll reach 2015 or so. Remember, I’ll be in Malmö and/or Copenhagen during the contest.
Introduction
An audience filled with flags, cheerful hosts accompanied by electronic music, a stage full of flashy light effects, seemingly endless pleasantries before the contest properly begins… yep, the first Eurovision contest after I was born isn’t far from what we know it as today.
Eurovision 1999 took place in Israel just as it would twenty years later, in its capital city of Jerusalem just as it did twenty years earlier. The number of participating countries was reduced from 25 to 23, so seven countries were relegated (Finland, Greece, Hungary, North Macedonia, Romania, Slovakia, Switzerland) and five rejoined (Austria, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Denmark, Iceland, Lithuania). Lithuania had last participated in 1994 and Hungary wouldn’t rejoin until 2005. Perhaps this decrease in participants was done to allow for commercial breaks between the songs, which were filled by mini-interval acts for the live audience and non-commercial broadcasters.
This year featured two massive changes to the rules: (1) the orchestra was abolished and (2) just like from 1973 to 1976, the language rule was abolished. Technically, the orchestra wasn’t fully abolished, but broadcasters could now opt out of providing one, which is what Israel did. From this point onwards, all Eurovision entries were sung entirely over a backing track.
The first winner of post-orchestra and post-language rule Eurovision was none other than Sweden with “Take Me to Your Heaven”, who would become the biggest power player till the present day. Iceland scored second place with another pop song in English, and Germany combined four languages to reach a respectable third place. One more fact: This was the first Eurovision with three presenters, which would be the most common amount from 2010 onwards. One of them sang Israel’s entry in 1992, “Ze Rak Sport”.
I frankly don’t have high expectations for these next few years of Eurovision. I’m bracing myself for a bunch of cheesy Eurodance, painfully off-key singing, and nonsensical English lyrics. Maybe Terry Wogan’s commentary will make it more bearable, we’ll see.
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