Last year, as a result of Ell & Nikki's win, Baku played host to the 2012 Contest, with Ell (aka Eldar Gasimov) playing co-host during both Semi-Finals and the Final night. The pair reunited on stage, first to sing the winning song at the beginning of the Final competition, then at the end of the night to present the winner's trophy to Loreen from Sweden. This year, Azerbaijan is keeping the song genre the same, but will be sending a solo male artist to the Contest for the first time. [Since most winners of the Contest are either solo female artists or female/male duos, going to the Contest with a solo male artist is considered a gamble, no matter how good the song]. But if you're going to make a bet, why not do it big with someone like Farid Mammodov, a twenty-one year old student at the national performing arts university, an employee of the Baku Jazz center, a wrestler, and a song-writer (one of his song he wrote competed in the national selection)...oh and the man can sing. Here he is performing Azerbaijan's official entry for Malmo Hold Me at the national selection competition. The song is pretty much guaranteed to make out of the Second Semi Final and will most likely get Azerbaijan another Top Five finish this year:
Monday, April 22, 2013
Azerbaijan
Though the last of the Caucasus countries to enter the Eurovision Song Contest (in 2008 in Belgrade), Azerbaijan is certainly one of the most successful from the eastern end of the Contest's spectrum. The first Azerbaijani entry by Elnur & Samir (with their good versus evil performance of the song Day After Day in full devil and angel costumes) placed the country into an impressive (and somewhat unexpected) eighth place. During the next two contests, the country continued its streak of placing in the top of the scoreboard (third in 2009 in Moscow and fifth in 2010 in Oslo). Then came Ell & Nikki's love song/ballad Running Scared, written and composed by Swedish Eurovision veterans Stefan Orn and Sandra Bjurman and Iain Farquharson from the UK. Performed wholly in English at the Dusseldorf competition in 2011, the song scored a total of 221 points and left favorites Italy and Sweden behind with 189 and 185 points respectively. [Note: I saw this performance live on Final night in Dusseldorf's Esprit Arena and had predicted a Top Five finish. The win was a surprise at that moment, but after watching the 2011 Final again, you can see how this song was able to beat out everyone else]:
Last year, as a result of Ell & Nikki's win, Baku played host to the 2012 Contest, with Ell (aka Eldar Gasimov) playing co-host during both Semi-Finals and the Final night. The pair reunited on stage, first to sing the winning song at the beginning of the Final competition, then at the end of the night to present the winner's trophy to Loreen from Sweden. This year, Azerbaijan is keeping the song genre the same, but will be sending a solo male artist to the Contest for the first time. [Since most winners of the Contest are either solo female artists or female/male duos, going to the Contest with a solo male artist is considered a gamble, no matter how good the song]. But if you're going to make a bet, why not do it big with someone like Farid Mammodov, a twenty-one year old student at the national performing arts university, an employee of the Baku Jazz center, a wrestler, and a song-writer (one of his song he wrote competed in the national selection)...oh and the man can sing. Here he is performing Azerbaijan's official entry for Malmo Hold Me at the national selection competition. The song is pretty much guaranteed to make out of the Second Semi Final and will most likely get Azerbaijan another Top Five finish this year:
Last year, as a result of Ell & Nikki's win, Baku played host to the 2012 Contest, with Ell (aka Eldar Gasimov) playing co-host during both Semi-Finals and the Final night. The pair reunited on stage, first to sing the winning song at the beginning of the Final competition, then at the end of the night to present the winner's trophy to Loreen from Sweden. This year, Azerbaijan is keeping the song genre the same, but will be sending a solo male artist to the Contest for the first time. [Since most winners of the Contest are either solo female artists or female/male duos, going to the Contest with a solo male artist is considered a gamble, no matter how good the song]. But if you're going to make a bet, why not do it big with someone like Farid Mammodov, a twenty-one year old student at the national performing arts university, an employee of the Baku Jazz center, a wrestler, and a song-writer (one of his song he wrote competed in the national selection)...oh and the man can sing. Here he is performing Azerbaijan's official entry for Malmo Hold Me at the national selection competition. The song is pretty much guaranteed to make out of the Second Semi Final and will most likely get Azerbaijan another Top Five finish this year:
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