On Saturday evening, Eurovision fans tuned in to watch 26 iconic Eurovision songs that never made it out of the semi-finals. Votes were cast, and in the end, Iceland’s Greta Salóme picked up the most votes for her 2016 entry “Hear Them Calling”, making her the winner of the #EurovisionAgain semi-final special.
The 26 featured semi-finalists had been selected by #EurovisionAgain organisers, with input from fans and a jury of Eurovision blogs and podcasts — including wiwibloggs!
A running order was put together, with the Eurovision ethos of presenting the best possible show. Fans tuned into the live stream on YouTube and commented along on Twitter.
After the Eurovision semi-final performances for all 26 acts were replayed, fans could vote for their favourites. While there were many favourites, there could be only one winner. Iceland’s Greta Salóme won with 32,007 points.
In second place was the Swiss sibling duo ZiBBZ and their 2018 entry “Stones”. The bronze went to Finland’s 2017 entry, the duo Norma John and their heartbreak ballad “Blackbird”.
? #EurovisionAgain Results ?
Votes have been checked and verified.
Thank you @Mentimeter ?
Here are the scores from the Semi Final Special Twitter jury ??
? A WIN FOR ICELAND ?? ?
??? ??? ???
Congratulations @GRETASALOME ?? pic.twitter.com/BW8OiJj41D— #EurovisionAgain (@EurovisionAgain) December 19, 2020
“Hear Them Calling” was also the favourite non-qualifier of wiwibloggs readers in our recent poll. Wiwibloggs readers came close to the #EurovisionAgain top three. Readers had “Blackbird” in second place and “Stones” third.
Greta Salóme reacts to winning the #EurovisionAgain semi-final special
The Icelandic diva herself recorded a short message, expressing her grattitude for winning the vote and sharing best wishes for the holidays.
“Hey everyone, this is Greta Salóme from Iceland. I want to say thank you so so much for the votes and all the support and all the love last night in the #EurovisionAgain competition. I am so grateful and so thankful for all the support and all the love I have received from this amazing community, throughout two Eurovision entries and the past eight years.
“I really hope that you have a wonderful Christmas, happy holidays, and may [2021] bring lots of good things – and Eurovision – to every single one of us. Merry Christmas and happy holidays and thank you one more time.”
?? Here's last night's #EurovisionAgain champion @gretasalome with a beautiful message for you all ?
Find out what happened ? https://t.co/I9z2wF7ULj pic.twitter.com/MzN7xnxq15
— Eurovision Song Contest (@Eurovision) December 20, 2020
Greta Salóme first represented Iceland at Eurovision 2012. Singing in duet with Jónsi (who himself had already competed solo at Eurovision 2004), the pair performed the dramatic anthem “Never Forget”, which placed 20th in the grand final.
Greta then returned as a solo artist in 2016, after winning Söngvakeppnin with “Hear Them Calling”.
Going into the competition, “Hear Them Calling” had been a hot favourite to qualify, but in Stockholm it missed out, surprisingly placing only 14th. During the #EurovisionAgain special, fans on Twitter noted that the performance may have been hurt by the projection staging with its gloomy lighting doing Greta no favours. As well, the performance followed Russia’s “You Are the Only One” which also used a projection concept but with a much slicker effect. Nonetheless, the song remains a fan favourite.
#EurovisionAgain semi-final special – running order
- Norway: Stella Mwangi – “Haba Haba”
- Estonia: Koit Toome and Laura – “Verona”
- Belarus: Petr Elfimov – “Eyes That Never Lie”
- Bulgaria: Poli Genova – “Na Inat”
- Slovenia: Omar Naber – “Stop”
- The Netherlands: Edsilia Rombley – “On Top Of The World”
- Moldova: Eduard Romanyuta – “I Want Your Love”
- Finland: Norma John – “Blackbird”
- San Marino: Valentina Monetta – “Crisalide (Vola)”
- Romania: Ester Peony – “On A Sunday”
- Monaco: Séverine Ferrer – “La Coco-Dance”
- Greece: Yianna Terzi – “Oniro Mou”
- Denmark: DQ – “Drama Queen”
- Poland: Tulia – “Fire Of Love (Pali Się)”
- Switzerland: ZiBBZ – “Stones”
- North Macedonia: Jana Burčeska – “Dance Alone”
- Ireland: Molly Sterling – “Playing With Numbers”
- Montenegro: Who See – “Igranka”
- Croatia: Feminnem – “Lako Je Sve”
- Andorra: Anonymous – “Salvem El Món”
- Israel: Mei Finegold – “Same Heart”
- Slovakia: Kristina Pelakova – “Horehronie”
- Belgium: Kate Ryan – “Je T’adore”
- Czech Republic: Marta Jandová & Vaclav Noid Bárta – “Hope Never Dies”
- Iceland: Greta Salóme – “Hear Them Calling”
- Portugal: Suzy – “Quero Ser Tua
#EurovisionAgain will return next year
The #EurovisionAgain series of rewatching classic episodes of Eurovision was masterminded by journalist and Eurovision fan Rob Holley, as a way of helping to fill the gap caused by the cancellation of Eurovision 2020.
While the 2020 series of rewatch specials has now come to an end, organisers promise that #EurovisionAgain will be back for a new season next year. As well as there being plenty of years left to revisit, there are also plenty of semi-final non-qualifiers that still deserve another listen.
What do you think? Was “Hear Them Calling” your favourite non-qualifier? Which other songs deserve another listen? Tell us your favourites below!
On A Sunday (Romania 2019) and Oniro Mou (Greece 2018) were the ones I was hoping would go the farthest. Both of those shocked me when they didn’t qualify.
Verona (Estonia 2017) is a fun song that I still listen to, but I never thought it was particularly good. Surprised to see it get so much love.
I’m honestly baffled by the love for Verona. Dated, and he is as creepy AF.
My top 10 includes a lot of Balkan songs.
1. Omar Naber – Stop
2. Femminem – Lako je sve
3. Who see – Igranka
4. Poly genova – Na inat
5. Marta Jandová & Vaclav Noid Bárta – Hope Never dies
6. Norma John – Blackbird
7, Jana Burceska – Dance alone
8. Greta Salome – Hear them calling
9. Kristina Pelakova – Horehronie
10. Kate Ryan – Je T’adore
I would have voted Selma – If I had your love, the top mark if she would have been in. ?
I watched this with my cousin. We both agreed that Greta Salome’s “Hear them calling” was the clear winner; the song, production and performance were in a different league to the rest. We also really love “Blackbird” of course, Also, “Horehronie” stands out for being unique, and “Oniro Mou” just sounds so beautiful. 🙂
Great to see Kate Ryan do so well after all these years. I wonder if she will give Eurovision another go one day? Just a thought.
All the more reason to be redeemed. A musician should never be ruled by the studio.
Of course I had no intention of getting you riled up. 🙂
Now I loved Je t’adore but having looked at some of her stuff on YouTube you seem to be right. Just awful dance covers of great songs by great artists. I’m amazed she was able to perform an original composition.
No, of course, same here, but Kate just seems to take the track and add a dance backing track and sees the job as done.
Justice for Kate Ryan, finally!
First of all, how on earth could Haba Haba win Icebreaker for Norway? Anyway, I think Hear Them Calling is a worthy winner, it is a decent song, it had a great staging and very good live vocals. It was unlucky because the 1st semi of ESC 2016 was one of the toughest. Howerver, I was not a huge fan of the song and I definitely prefer Never Forget (Iceland 2012) to Hear Them Calling. Well done though! Some other things that I’d like to comment, first of all I’m glad that Andorra was represented by their 2007 act and… Read more »
To answer your first question: Because “Haba Haba” is cheerful and a great show opener, whereas “Icebreaker” has those painful clash notes in the Chorus. Just kidding… I assume it is probably because “Haba Haba” was closer to qualifying than “Icebreaker” was, in terms of actual points.
The thing about points is one possibility (which would also explain having Suzy over Conan), but the other is diversifying the line-up with more uptempo numbers. As fan-favorite uptempo songs are slightly more likely to qualify, that leaves more beloved NQs on the slower tempo side. I guess that might be why in some cases where there was more than one talked-about song, the opted for the uptempo one.
If *only* points / placings were crucial, it would be Tanja over Koit & Laura, but everyone knows who is a far more desired fan-favorite. 🙂
2004 was the most difficult semi as this one had the most candidates in it.
I was right on Iceland or Finland winning!
No offence to fans but I dont get the love for ZIBBZ. It is a generic folk pop song you hear everywhere and struggle to remember I dont even remember it having any fan base or outrage over it not qualifying. No one talked about it that year and no one thought it could qualify. But now it is the second greatest non- qualifier
It was *one of* the songs fans talked about that it should have qualified in 2018, but it wasn’t the front runner at the time by any means. It was a liked song, for sure, but as I recall, there was even more outrage for Greece and Belgium, even if retroactively speaking, both of them had bigger staging issues than Switzerland did. In fact, their semi performance was an upgrade over the NF one. It was just a REALLY tough semi, filled with good songs.
I thought Stones was a better version of Gravity the previous year in terms of the Rag & bone man Human-like beat, and it had a decent message. I liked it, but if the weakest of the 10 qualifiers was Sara Aalto, it was a testament to how good the heat was, and therefore it wasn’t really robbed, just incredibly unlucky that it had the draw it got.
I agree, I’ve posted something similar below.
If I remember correctly, it was not a fan favorite when it was released. I was even very low in the odds. But then things changed when the rehearsals started, and many of us wanted it to qualify.
This was my major takeaway from the show. Most of the other top songs in the final ranking (especially the top 8) are favourites amongst the ESC fans but Stones isn’t one that was a particularly shocking non-qualifier.
I wasn’t happy with most of the choices that were put forward for this show but “Verona” was my clear winner. Glad to see it did well.
It’s your typical Swiss entry: it’s not bad, but it’s bland af. It’s good enough that people think it’s deserving to qualify, but it’s not compelling enough to make people pick up their phones and actually vote. So at the end you’re left with a seemingly good song that did not qualify, you wonder why (even though you probably did not vote for it yourself) and you struggle to even remember how it goes.
I’ve already posted these comments in the wrong story (Wiwi’s own vote for best qualifier). But here they are again, because they are meant for the Eurovision Again vote: I’m really confused with Switzerland 2018 coming 2nd. I had no recollection of this being any sort of fan favourite at the time, and I don’t recall any outrage at all that it didn’t qualify? Now apparently it’s the second-greatest non-qualifier of all time? It’s barely even the second-greatest Swiss non-qualifier. How did Monaco 2006 make it in?? One of Eurovision’s top 10 biggest train wreck performances for sure, not one of… Read more »
It was interesting but I have points to raise *Why weren’t Hungary, Lithuania, Latvia, Serbia and Armenia in there, when they had the ace songs Az En Apam, Eastern European Funk, Cake To Bake and In Too Deep and the fan fave Walking Out, which was the Hear Them Calling of TA in the eyes of many? *Why no songs from 2008 and 2012, 2 important contests in the maturity of the ESC? Vrag Naj Vzame should have been the Slovenian entry in this list, not Stop. *However, glad that Quero Ser Tua and Haba Haba were in there rather… Read more »
Just a tiny correction. You’ve written “Never Forget” as her 2016 entry instead of “Hear Them Calling”. Great article by the way
She just couldn’t forget. 😀
This Eurovision Again special has more diversity in languages than your actual modern Eurovision final: English, Bulgarian, Croatian, Polish, French, Tahitian, Swahili, Greek, Montenegrin, Slovenian, Catalan, Portuguese, Italian, Slovak, and Hebrew.
Voters often prefer English songs, but they have nothing on the juries in that regard. In fact, a majority of national language songs had higher televote score compared to their jury score. Sure, there are exceptions (Hungary 2019, for example), but mostly it’s the juries who botch most non-English songs’ chances. Which is absurd, in my opinion, because they’d *have to* be contractually obligated to read the lyrics, but I’m not sure if they are or is that enforced at all. Still, there are plenty of non-English songs with great results, so I would still encourage people not to give… Read more »
In 2018, we saw Albania fare very well with the tastemakers, proving that OLS songs in a language with less than 25m speakers, can fare well with them, and, in TA itself the next year, Italy, proving that the juries do like both Italy and R&b.
Continues – Now the finals in 2019: ITALY – 3rd in televote, 4th with the juries ICELAND – 6th in televote, 15th with the juries SLOVENIA – 11th in televote, 15th with the juries (tie with Iceland) SERBIA – 13th in televote, 19th with the juries (rotating from their semi stance) SPAIN – 14th in televote, 25th with the juries ALBANIA – 17th in televote, and 17th with the juries * FRANCE – 18th in televote, 13th with the juries * So, out of 7 songs in non-English in the finals, juries helped one and left one with the same… Read more »
That is the fact I am not trying to dispute. English songs do tend to have a slightly better result on average. I was just emphasizing that juries tend to be the ones derayling them down even more than the public does. By a place, three or five… 😉 However, the fact that most songs *are* in English also gives a big statistical push for them to win. We could also make an argument of them being sparse, but mostly evenly distributed throughout the voting. Remember in 2017, how every single song in a language other than English advanced to… Read more »
I agree. I am always prone to hearing more languages (as well as styles and genres) for the sake of diversity, but imposing such rule feels artificial and actually closes more doors than it opens. I would like some countries to decide for themselves to change a pace at some point (for example, the Nordics, Azerbaijan and Russia haven’t opted for national language in awhile, but also, it would be nice to hear Portugal or Italy switching to English for one time). We cannot force that to happen, though. Even the national language rules enforced by some selections seem counterproductive,… Read more »
Swedish is also an official language for finnish people so that type of rule where Finland could only send finnish entries would discriminate the population that speaks Swedish as their main language and would eventually end up for Finland to leave Eurovision