From the opening strains of Tum Tum Tuh-Tuh-Tuh Tum Tahhhh Tuh Tum…. the prelude to Marc-Antoine Charpentier’s Te Deum we know we’re in for our traditional annual fun-fest 
For any of you colonial brethren on the other side of the pond, here in Euroland we have something that’s called the Eurovision Song Contest.
It’s a “song” contest that’s, well… it’s quite difficult to describe. Let’s just say that it’s kitsch, camp, fun and annually highly addictive… well, for me and the Lady Wife it is, anyway. Now that the Eurovision Song Contest has been regarded as relatively cool-ish, I can admit that the Lady Wife and I have been fans for what seems like forever. Even when admitting to liking the event would have been slightly embarrassing.
If you don’t know, the Eurovision Song Contest is a massive live annual TV event in which member countries of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) have a contest to see who performs the best song and then in turn hosts the following year’s event. The television event itself is transmitted across the Eurovision Network by the EBU simultaneously to all
countries… yep, it’s one big party!
Strangely enough, given the name being “Euro”vision, you get countries like Morocco and Israel taking part. Don’t ask me why, but that’s not the only quirky thing about the whole Eurovision fest.
The whole thing started way back in 1956. Back then it was a huge event seeing European countries come together for an event like never before and with a then massive television audience of 4 million people tuning in.
This year, for the first time in the history of the Eurovision Song Contest, there are two semi-finals to decide which 25 countries will be represented in the final on Saturday 24th May. You might be interested to know that the first ever Eurovision Song Contest was also held on the 24th of May in 1956.
The event itself is more like a party than a serious song contest, although some countries do seem to take it more seriously unlike us here in the UK. Here we see it for what it is… high-camp tongue-in-cheek fun, not to be taken seriously. Of course the Eurovision Song Contest wouldn’t be what it is without our very own Uncle Terrence at the helm; sprinkling his commentary with his very own inimitable quips that reflect the way the Eurovision Song Contest should be taken with regards to taste.
Together with questionable voting from countries, outlandish costumes and sets on occasions, with a veritable smorgasbord of cultural quirkiness the annual event is always something my Lady Wife and I look forward to.
It’s always a bottle of fermented grape juice, some munchies together with a take-away (take-out) while we settle down, switch on the box, switch off our minds, kick back and soak in the razzmatazz of the contest.
Without fail, we always doze off once all the acts have taken part and the voting starts and wake up near the end of the voting by the crowd cheering or jeering at either a “nil points” or “douze points” interspersed with Uncle Terrence’s cutting quips regarding the very questionable voting among the Balkan and Scandinavian participants.
All in all it’s a great event, like I said earlier, one big kick-ass party all across Euroland.
It’s fun, it’s infuriating, it’s cool and it’s kitsch; all rolled up into one big pink sugary almond bon-bon with fluffy bits on the inside and rhinestones and glitterballs on the outside.
We love it.
Bring it on
Tum Tum Tuh-Tuh-Tuh Tum Tahhhh Tuh Tum……
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For a taste of a typical Eurovision Song Contest, check out this PDF document entitled “Eurovision I-Spy” from the BBC at
http://www.bbc.co.uk/eurovision/party/eurovision_i_spy.pdf
Eurovision links worth douze points include.
www.bbc.co.uk/eurovision/
www.bbc.co.uk/eurovision/about/history.shtml
www.eurovision.tv
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurovision_Song_Contest
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