Music News

Ukraine wins Eurovision, the most batsh*t crazy song contest of them all

As predicted by many of the bookies, Ukraine’s Kalush Orchestra topped the voting of the 25 entrants in the 2022 Eurovision Song Contest (the 66th annual, if you’re counting.) The winning song was written about the singer’s mother. The country is pretty happy about this.

The voting procedure is a bit hard to follow, but it shook out like this.

First, we have the votes cast by a panel of music industry boffins from across Europe and Australia (which, for the purposes of Eurovision, is considered part of Europe. I don’t know why.)

  • United Kingdom
  • Sweden
  • Spain
  • Ukraine
  • Portugal

Once that’s done, there’s the fan vote. While those watching on TV and online could vote up to 20 times, no one is allowed to vote for their own country. This is the part of the competition that can result in some wild swings. Sentimentality and human nature apparently tipped things greatly in Ukraine’s favour.

As the audience votes were tallied up, countries that were mathematically eliminated as the voting progressed, were allowed to transfer their accumulated points to another country of their choosing.

When it all finally came to an end, Ukraine came out on top with 631 points. Sam Ryder of the UK finished second with 449 points–impressive, since last year, the UK entry garnered a grand total of ZERO points.

The whole thing lasted over four hours. Here are the last few minutes, which is the only part that counts.

Here’s the reaction of Kalush Orchestra.

Two points of note. First, by winning Eurovision, Ukraine has earned the right to host the 2023 finals. (Uh, okay…) And there will be a new European nation included in the competition: Canada!

Wait–what? *checks notes* No, that’s correct. Canada will be part of Eurovision 2023. (Hey, Celine Dion won the whole thing once while competing for France,)

The final standings are as follows:

  1. Ukraine
  2. UK
  3. Spain
  4. Sweden
  5. Serbia

Other countries in the competition are:

  • Greece
  • Romanica
  • Moldova
  • Estonia
  • France
  • Germany
  • Italy
  • Armenia
  • Norway
  • Finland
  • Iceland
  • Belgium
  • The Netherlands
  • Portugal
  • Czechia
  • Lithuania
  • Poland
  • Azerbaijan
  • Switzerland
  • Australia

Normally Russians would send an entry, but they’re currently in the penalty box for obvious reasons.

Alan Cross

is an internationally known broadcaster, interviewer, writer, consultant, blogger and speaker. In his 40+ years in the music business, Alan has interviewed the biggest names in rock, from David Bowie and U2 to Pearl Jam and the Foo Fighters. He’s also known as a musicologist and documentarian through programs like The Ongoing History of New Music.

Alan Cross has 37969 posts and counting. See all posts by Alan Cross

Let us know what you think!

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.