(Newswire.net — May 14, 2017) — Portugal is the winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 2017, for the first time since its debut in 1964. No stage performances, no dazzling special effects, no fireworks or eye-caching outfits, just pure emotion.
Portuguese singer Salvador Sobral, 27, charmed the audience and juries with his emotionally affecting ballad Amar Pelos Dois (Love for Both), written by his sister, Luisa.
“We live in a world of fast food music. This is a victory for music… music isn’t fireworks, music is feeling,” Sobral said while accepting the award.
When first scores started coming in and maximum points going to Sobral, it was clear that professionals sitting on TV juries across Europe hinted that this year is all about pure emotions. A new voting system also showed that the audience around the world shared the emotion and music taste of professionals from TV studios, by awarding maximum points to the Portuguese singer.
This year’s Eurovision was unique for it celebrated love. The Macedonian singer was proposed to live in front of millions of viewers. She said ‘yes.’
The Belarus duo ended their performance with a tongue kiss right there on the stage, leaving 200 million international viewers feeling awkward.
The Italian crew threw a dancing gorilla on the stage, but it was not enough to enhance the quality of the song. We can only hope that whoever was inside of the gorilla costume for more than three hours was paid adequately for this hellish embarrassment.
Croat’s singer is worth mentioning as he actually managed to sing he/she duet all by himself. While Greece’s contester was struggling to hit high notes, the Belgian singer didn’t have to as there weren’t any. The whole song was flat as was the stage she stood at.
The stage was quite impressive though. More than 4,000 square feet covered with LED panels provided supreme visualization of each song, but the singer from Portugal demonstrated it is all about the song and the performance, and that was why he won.
This Eurovision Song Contest will be remembered also for a scandalous prank, when a guy, draped in the Australian flag, stormed the stage during the half time. While cameras followed last year’s winner Jamala singing on a smaller circular stage in the fan pit, the man, later identified as Ukrainian prankster Vitalii Sediuk, jumped on the stage to moon more than 200 million people watching the contest live.
The video of the incident instantly become viral.