Sweden Tops the Charts at Eurovision 2023
2023 Eurovision champion Loreen holds her trophy | Photo Credit: Dominic Lipinski/Getty Images via Billboard
The 2023 Eurovision Song Contest was held in Liverpool, England. The previous year’s winners were from Ukraine, so in keeping with tradition, they were to host this year’s competition. However, due to safety concerns regarding the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, England hosted in lieu of Ukraine. 2023 marked the 67th year that Eurovision was held. 37 countries participated, with a reported 162 million viewers across 38 European countries, according to the EBU (European Broadcasting Union). The winner of this year’s contest was Sweden, represented by pop artist Loreen.
Founded in 1956, the Eurovision Song Contest is an annual songwriting competition in Europe. Solo artists or bands are sent to represent their countries and compete for the grand trophy. The winners are chosen via voting, which is a combination of a jury of five industry professionals from each represented country and viewers at home.
Loreen, the winner of this year’s contest, received a judges’ score of 340 points for her song “Tattoo”, maintaining a huge point margin above the second-place jury scorer, Israel, which acquired 177 points. Loreen had previously won Eurovision in 2012 with her wildly successful hit “Euphoria”. She became the second person to win the song contest twice, and with her victory, Sweden tied Ireland’s record for most total wins at seven. “Tattoo” is a pop song about a couple breaking up and the marks their relationship has left on them. Following its debut at a Swedish music festival, the song reached number one on the Swedish singles chart. After Eurovision, it reached number one in nine other European countries and beat the record of most streams in one day by a Eurovision song, which was previously held by 2021’s winner “Zitti e buoni” by Måneskin. It won with a total of 583 votes, comprising 340 jury points and 243 public votes.
Finland managed to secure second place this year by winning the public vote with their song “Cha Cha Cha” by Käärijä. The song is a mix of metal and electro-pop, with elements of dance-pop. It was a smashing hit, breaking the record for the highest public score, with a score of 376. It was also the first song in Finnish to enter the UK top ten single charts. Out of the top three scorers it was the only song in its country’s native language instead of English. The total score the song received was 526, only 57 points behind Sweden’s entry.
The third-place contestant was Israel. Singer Noa Kirel performed her pop number “Unicorn”, and managed to score a total of 362 points. Kirel stated that her song was inspired by her 13-year-old self at the beginning of her musical career. General reception for the song was mediocre, with the Israeli leading news network Ynet calling it “lacking [in] courage and soul” and describing her performance as “lackluster”. However, others applauded Noa’s performance, and expressed amazement at the dance number that was included near the end. “That dance break moment at the end is going to be bloody INSANE, and one of my most anticipated moments of this contest” said Lucy, an interviewee for wiwibloggs, an independent website dedicated to the Eurovision Song Contest.
Eurovision helps propel many up-and-coming artists into stardom due to the amount of publicity the competition gets annually. Måneskin, Celine Dion, Olivia Newton-John, Bonnie Tyler, and ABBA are just some of the musicians who gained popularity after competing, regardless if they won or not.