ESC Covers, like in previous years, google translated ESC Norge discussion on the Eurovision song contest positions, from Norwegian to English.
This is a blog post and only represents the writer Morten Thomassen’s own views.
If there’s anything our French friends should have learned by now, it’s that the rest of the participating countries generally like a good French chanson much better than when they try to spice things up and add some rhythm to the song they submit, because in the decade we’re in now, the ballads have only given top-ten placements, the rest of the songs have ended up in the bottom half of the results list.
This year, Louane and her song about mothers “Maman” was one of the songs I thought could win, but when the people thought that this song (incomprehensibly) did not deserve more than 50 points, it is not enough that you were in third place after the juries had had their say. Why well-performed ballads (with one exception) did so poorly with the people is something you can only wonder about, maybe they were all celebrating Norway’s National Day and thought they had to spend their hard-earned phone money on something festive, who knows?
Louane’s real name is Anne Edwige Maria Peichert, so you can see why she went with a single artist name, and she has been a big artist in her home country for over 10 years, so once again this country sent one of its big stars who actually also does acting and she has been in several films and TV productions, in other words, no wonder she could get into a role on the TV screen and the performance she had of her song was jury food so it held up and should have engaged more of the people who voted, in my opinion.
Singing a song in the sand and rain must be called a high-class risk sport, but vocally this was almost flawless and when the song is about missing your deceased mother and intensely telling her that things are going well after all, this requires tons of empathy and it is also delivered to a high degree if you ask me.
It’s possible that the song was a bit repetitive and thus boring to those ears that struggle a bit with liking ballads, that’s the only explanation I can understand why people largely ignored this song in terms of points.
Our French friends in the TV industry have obviously sold ESC well to the top tier of French artists, we’ll see if they choose top shelf or if they take another round with a national final, if they do the latter it may seem as if those who “trade” in artists don’t reach that shelf and it’s noticeable in this country’s results from time to time.
Featured image – Corinne Cumming – EBU