When Eurovision comes to Liverpool… 160 million viewers including the King? No pressure then, Mae!
- This year’s grand final of the Eurovision Song Contest in Liverpool has the royal seal of approval
- King Charles told Mae Muller he would ‘watch with great interest’
This year’s grand final of the Eurovision Song Contest has the royal seal of approval. On a visit to the venue, the Liverpool Arena, the King told British contestant Mae Muller that he would ‘watch with great interest’ and ‘prod her on’. ‘Thank you. No pressure,” she joked.
The Eurovision Song Contest is one of television’s major evening events. Whether you’re a superfan or you just don’t care, it offers spectacle, a real sense of community watching and brilliant pop music.
At last year’s contest, held in Italy, the UK had their strongest entry in years with Sam Ryder’s Space Man, but no one begrudged the Ukrainians their victory with Kalush Orchestra’s exuberant Stefania.
In happier times, this year’s event would have been held in Ukraine, but due to the Russian invasion, the UK offered to host and Liverpool won the competition to host it.
For the first time in the history of the UK Eurovision Song Contest, both semifinals (Tuesday and Thursday at 8pm) are live on BBC1. British viewers can vote in the second semi-final. But it is the final, in which 26 countries compete, that will attract more than 160 million viewers worldwide.
On a visit to the venue, the Liverpool Arena, the King told British contestant Mae Muller that he would ‘watch with great interest’ and ‘prod her on’.
Whether you’re a superfan or you just don’t care, it offers spectacle, a real sense of community watching and brilliant pop music
For the first time in UK Eurovision Song Contest history, both semifinals (Tuesday and Thursday at 8pm) are live on BBC1
Graham Norton and Mel Giedroyc (top, with commentator Rylan Clark) will provide the wasp-like commentary, while Ted Lasso’s Hannah Waddingham, pop star Alesha Dixon and Ukrainian singer Julia Sanina take on hosting duties.
A Kalush Orchestra performance will kick off the show, and we hear from 2022 runner-up Sam Ryder during the first interval. The second interval act celebrates Liverpool’s pop heritage, with six previous Eurovision acts reinterpreting some classic hits.
The beauty of Eurovision is that you can watch it with amused detachment, you can watch it as a competition and try to work out the different countries’ voting strategies based on their geopolitical allegiances, or you can just watch it as pop music. festival.
And who will win? At the time of writing, the bookmakers have Sweden’s entry, Tattoo, sung by 2012 winner Loreen, as the odds-on favourite. The British entry, Mae Muller’s I Wrote A Song, is less favourite, but it’s certainly not out of the running.