It’s coming to the time of year when we cringe in front of our screens for another epically long bonanza of musical mayhem.
Thank our lucky stars we’ve got Terry Wogan to be our guide through the endless tide of bizarre and often dire performances.
This year’s entrant however for England may prove to be more substantial than other years. If we look to the past, we’ve not had a particularly good run of successes of late. We only have to go back a few years to remember Gemini – the couple who obviously didn’t have any kind of twin affinity as they seemed to start in different pitches not only to each other but to the backing music. It’s hard enough to win votes in a European contest with political voting and giving a dire performance was the nail in the coffin on that occasion. Going back many years, when Cliff Richards, Katrina and the Waves and the Bay City Rollers (ok, so going back many, many years) won the contest, the most notable thing was the ‘big names’ that entered.
This may be our saving grace, this year. It may have been a clever BBC Entertainment gimmick, to get Andrew Lloyd-Webber to do a talent show for the Eurovision Song Contest entrants, ensuring viewers for both BBC broadcasts, but the inclusion of such a big name behind it, may just work in our favour. The song, entitled "Its My Time" will be sung by the winner of Your Country Needs You, Jade Ewen, and the song is written by Andrew Lloyd Weber himself. The BBC Website describes Jade as "having the technical prowess of Whitney and Mariah, the classical timelessness of Diana Ross and the eternal cool of Donna Summer.
Combining an outstanding vocal performance with cutting-edge choreography Jade embodies the current mood in music - credible cool with a mainstream twist." The song itself, is a typically characteristic Andrew Lloyd Weber song, predictable yet exciting climaxes, standard almost pedestrian, yet still effective chord progressions, and Jade certainly sings it with conviction and executes the song well.
The contest is fast approaching, with the final being broadcast across Europe on May 16 from Moscow. We can always expect the usual blend of transsexuals, 13ft monster costumes, and scantily clad dancers; however, this year Jade is certainly worth watching out for, and is highly tipped to do well in the future regardless of how the Eurovision Song Contest might go.
LIAM FERROUGHBY
TV Reporter
