Loving the way the stage looks for this. Such wonderful colours. It's such a jolly, loose, catchy song. I hope people vote for this.

Labels: Eurovision 2011, Serbia

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Ana Ivanovic's Eurovision appearance must have done her the world of good. She's just won the French Open. She will also climb to be the world's number one woman tennis player when the new rankings are announced on Monday. Her compatriots Novak Djokovic (who started the scoring in the first Eurovision semi-final) and Jelena Jankovic also made the French Open semi-finals, giving Serbia three of the last eight in the singles events.

If you didn't see her in one of the Eurovision semi-finals, you were probably watching the BBC version. I haven't seen it, but I don't think they showed Ivanovic's filmed 'Welcome To Belgrade' tourist information piece, which was shown in countries where they don't have adverts, while the other countries were seeing the ads. I'm told that the UK showed Paddy instead. Never fear. YouTube to the rescue! This produced massive cheers from the locals, even in the sparsely attended rehearsal I attended, when it appeared on the screens.



In other sporting news, Curtain Call and Kandahar Run have just failed to make me any money in the Epsom Derby. I've also bet on Germany (realistic) and Croatia (14-1 outsider because I'm in an ex-Yugo kind of mood) as my each way bets for Euro 2008.

Labels: betting, Euro 2008, Eurovision 2008, football, Serbia, sport, tennis

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Serbia - 'Oro' - Jelena Tomašević ft. Bora Dugić



Eurovision is Serbia's to lose this year, but lose it they may not. I have strong feeling we may be going to Belgrade again next year. If this wins, one of the hosts will have to get the other one to give him his prize, as he wrote it.

Labels: Eurovision 2008, Serbia

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[15:22] Vojislav Kostunica, the Serbian Prime Minister, has just resigned, dissolved the Serbian parliament and called new elections. I wonder what effect this will have on the EBU's confidence that Eurovision can go ahead in Beograd?

He has called the election for Sunday 11 May, to coincide with local elections. I believe this is the date that Eurovision rehearsals are due to start in the Beogradska Arena.

This part of the BBC's report sounds ominous:

"The government in Belgrade has allegedly agreed a secret plan against Kosovo and countries that recognise it. It is unclear what it contains."

Labels: elections, Eurovision 2008, Serbia

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'The One And Only', or 'That show with the Dusty Springfield woman' as we've been calling it since week one, has been won by Dusty Springfield tonight, which should have surprised no one and is very well deserved. She was amazing. I don't think there's been a more obvious winner of a TV singing competition since, ooh, Connie as Maria.

The next obvious win will be next Saturday when Dustin, not Dusty, wins the ticket to Eurovision from Ireland, where he works in North Dublin as a builder, despite being a turkey. A turkey who looks like a vulture. A puppet turkey vulture. That's him looking down on you from the top left. If Dustin doesn't win next week I will live on potatoes for the week after. Possibly.

Dustin was even on The One Show in the UK this week, when they announced that the UK's Eurovision hopefuls would be featured on the show before our national final. (I'm hoping that our show features at least one ex-soap star, a transparent girlband, Bob the Builder, a failed Maria and a singing dustman, but what do I know?) Westlife were also in the studio when Dustin appeared by video link 'from Ireland' and Adrian Chiles seemed surprised that Westlife knew of Dustin, which is odd, as the turkey has been famous in Ireland longer than Westlife have and released a fair few albums and singles of his own. If the BBC researcher had been skilled in the art of YouTube searching - admittedly it's not something anyone can manage - they could even have found this, which I had seen before, and then no one would have been surprised. Dustin even manages a reference to last year's disastrous Eurovision result for Ireland.



At least there were surprises in Sweden's televised singing competition tonight. I watched the second Melodifestivalen heat live on the net (in almost judder-free, full screen quality - thank you SVT). The horrible homophobe Carola had teamed up with the previously likeable (although I will now question his judgment, or his level of desperation) Andreas Johnson, who she cruelly beat to the Eurovision place in 2006. Despite Sweden's liberalism, they make strange allowances for this bloody awful woman and this, in theory, should have been a dream ticket to the final. However, they didn't make it. The only managed to win a place in the 'Andra Chansen' second chance heat, which means they finished third or fourth tonight. I laughed a lot, especially as the camera was on her face when the result was revealed and she looked like she had just realised she had wet herself. It was priceless.

Sanna Nielsen claimed one of the places in the final with a good ballad which she sang superbly at first. (She wobbled a bit in her reprise, but she was already through by then, so I think the shock of qualifying was getting to her a little). She sings in English superbly, with very clear enunciation and very little accent, which lifted her song way above the others tonight.

The other finalists were Rongedal, who did a great presentation of a pop song, Just A Minute, with twins (I presume) looking like Richard O'Brien in red suits, singing like Jake Shears. It clearly caught the Swedes' attention.

However, I can't help feeling that Sweden's best chance for Beograd has gone by the wayside. Andra Generationen finished fifth, so will go no further. Their song Kebabpizza Slivovitza, although it was tonight's light relief, would have gone down well with ALL the Balkan countries and picked up votes from everywhere else too. It sounded like a Swedish pop song performed by a Macedonian wedding band, which is pretty much what it was. With a nod to the Eurovision host nation in the title, it would have gone down well in the hall at least. (Slivovitza is Serbia's 'national drink'; a plum liqueur that I look forward to sampling when in Belgrade!)

Oh well, Eurovision in Belgrade has more to worry about than whatever song Sweden is sending. The elephant in the room is about to wake up and roar. Following the election of the 'pro-European' candidate as President in Serbia last weekend, Kosovo seems certain to declare independence tomorrow. The streets of Belgrade are full of people already tonight. Let's hope they manage to come to a peaceful solution.

Labels: Beograd, Eurovision 2008, Kosovo, Melodifestivalen, Serbia, Sweden

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I just had a moment. One of those moments when you realise how much it means to a 'new' country to win Eurovision, for all that we dismiss it in the UK.

If you're not at least slightly moved by this, I'll be very surprised. It's Marija Šerifović's homecoming to Belgrade last night, where she is joined by 50,000 fans, most of whom seem to be singing along to 'Molitva'.



Courtesy of RTS, via ESC Today

Labels: Eurovision 2007, Marija Šerifović, Serbia

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...you're watching Serbian TV and an advert comes on that you've never seen before, and you find yourself shouting at your friend, "Look! He used to be in Crossroads! The revived version. The actor's called Neil!"

Indeed, it was Neil Grainger, who played Phil Berry in Crossroads v2.0. It looks as if this Crossroads fansite might like me to report this Serbian 'sighting', as they don't appear to have seen him since Crossroads closed its doors for the third and (probably) final time. We may not have seen much of him, but we've certainly heard him. He's done a lot of voiceover work, including a British Army recruitment ad, which is quite noticeably him. I wonder if he even knows he's been on Serbian TV, 'speaking' Serbian?

Labels: Crossroads, Neil Grainger, Serbia, TV

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Chig felt rather sad this morning, waking up to the news that John Inman had died in the early hours. I am also full of cold and extremely run down, so I've been off work today. I will somehow manage to get to Glitterball Mansions this evening to watch TV as Germany and Serbia pick their songs for Eurovision. We may raise a glass (more likely a cup of tea) to salute Dame John Inman. Tomorrow, Chig goes into hospital for a minor operation. (Don't worry, nothing serious. In and out the same day.)

Labels: Eurovision 2007, Germany, John Inman, Serbia

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