World Song Contest

With some participants, just like Brazil, which finally withdrew, the ninth edition of the World Song Contest finally was a battle between 31 countries. December being a special month: there was no qualifying round. So we had a final with 31 songs. According to the participants, this was so far the best edition, with several favourites. As a results, only the winner managed to score more than 100 points.

After t.A.T.u.'s victory in WSC .08, it was now sure that famous names could win the contest. Some countries tried their luck with big stars. For the third time, Canada was represented by Celine Dion, this time with an English song, and Darren Hayes, former singer of Savage Garden, took part for Australia. But noone was famous enough to beat the Queen of Pop. It was clear when this edition began than the United States of America was the one to beat. With Madonna in the contest the question soon became: who will came second ?

And for the second position, it was a real fight as there was only 13 points between the runner up and the song which reached the 7th position. On the other hand we had a clear winner with the USA taking the title with a gap of 60 points ahead of Poland, which finished in the top 10 for the seven times in 9 editions, and runner up for the second time. Amongst the country which did better than in previous editions, Germany, Estonia and the Philippines reached a top 20 position. Sweden and Italy didn't reach the top 20 for the first time. Leader of the National League Table, Greece, reached its lowest final position so far. Latvia and Bulgaria were once again amongst the worst score and Lithuania came last for the second time.

So without a surprise, Madonna won this edition of the contest with her number 1 hit Hung Up. After Australia, the United States of America are the second non european country to win the contest. Poland came second, and United Kingdom third.

Madonna (born Madonna Louise Ciccone on Aug 16, 1958) moved from her native Michigan to New York in 1977, with dreams of becoming a ballet dancer. In 1979, she became part of the Patrick Hernandez Revue, a disco outfit that had the hit "Born to Be Alive." She traveled to Paris with Hernandez; it was there that she met Dan Gilroy, who would soon become her boyfriend. Upon returning to New York, the pair formed the Breakfast Club, a pop/dance group. Madonna originally played drums for the band, but she soon became the lead singer. In 1980, she left the band and formed Emmy with her former boyfriend, drummer Stephen Bray. Soon, Bray and Madonna broke off from the group and began working on some dance/disco-oriented tracks. A demo tape of these tracks worked its way to Mark Kamins, a New York-based DJ/producer. Kamins directed the tape to Sire Records, which signed the singer in 1982. Kamins produced Madonna's first single, "Everybody," which became a club and dance hit at the end of 1982; her second single, 1983's "Physical Attraction," was another club hit. In June of 1983, she had her third club hit with the bubbly "Holiday," which was written by Jellybean Benitez. Madonna's self-titled debut album was released in September of 1983; "Holiday" became her first Top 40 hit the following month. "Borderline" became her first Top Ten hit in March of 1984, beginning a remarkable string of 17 consecutive Top Ten hits. Madonna's second album, Like a Virgin, was released at the end of 1984. The title track hit number one in December, staying at the top of the charts for six weeks. During 1985, Madonna became an international celebrity, selling millions of records on the strength of her stylish, sexy videos and forceful personality. After "Material Girl" became a number two hit in March, Madonna began her first tour, supported by the Beastie Boys. A more ambitious and accomplished record than her two previous albums, True Blue was released in 1986, to both more massive commercial success and critical acclaim. "Papa Don't Preach" became her fourth number one hit in the U.S. At the beginning of 1987, she had her fifth number one single with "Open Your Heart," the third number one from True Blue alone. The title cut from the soundtrack of her third feature film, Who's That Girl?, was another chart-topping hit, although the film itself was a box office bomb. Like a Prayer, released in the spring of 1989, was her most ambitious and far-reaching album, incorporating elements of pop, rock, and dance. It was another number one hit and launched the number one title track as well as "Express Yourself," "Cherish," and "Keep It Together," three more Top Ten hits. In April 1990, she began her massive Blonde Ambition tour, which ran throughout the entire year. Her first greatest-hits album, The Immaculate Collection, followed at the end of the year. It featured two new songs, including the number one single "Justify My Love," which sparked another controversy with its sexy video; the second new song, "Rescue Me," became the highest-debuting single by a female artist in U.S. chart history, entering the charts at number 15. In 1992, Madonna released Sex, an expensive, steel-bound soft-core pornographic book that featured hundreds of erotic photographs of herself, several models, and other celebrities as well as selected prose. Sex received scathing reviews and enormous negative publicity, yet that didn't stop the accompanying album, Erotica, from selling over two million copies. Bedtime Stories, released two years later, was a more subdued affair than Erotica. Initially, it didn't chart as impressively, prompting some critics to label her a has-been, yet the album spawned her biggest hit, "Take a Bow," which spent seven weeks at number one. Madonna came back in 1998 with new material. The album Ray of Light was heavily influenced by electronica, techno, and trip-hop, thereby updating her classic dance-pop sound for the late '90s. Within a month, the record was shaping up to be her biggest album since Like a Prayer. Two years later she returned with Music, which reunited her with Orbit and also featured production work from Mark "Spike" Stent and Mirwais, a French electro-pop producer/musician in the vein of Daft Punk and Air. Her sober 2003 album, American Life, was hardly a huge success while Confessions on a Dance Floor marked her return to the dance-oriented material that had made her a star. Released in late 2005, it topped the Billboard charts and was accompanied by a worldwide tour in 2006. She inched closer to the completion of her Warner Bros contract with 2008's Hard Candy, an R&B album whose first single, "4 Minutes", topped the singles charts in several countries. The album was supported with the Sticky & Sweet Tour, which concluded in September 2009 and produced her third live CD/DVD package in 2010.