World Song Contest

31 countries took part in the 10th edition of the World Song Contest, in December 2005. Madonna's example had to be followed. This time Colombia, for its first participation, chose its biggest star, Shakira, while Italy was represented by Laura Pausini for the 4th time. Some would say this is a lack of originality. But this ingredient was really present with, for example, France, represented by a children's choir, or Malta, with a song which sometimes felt classic. The biggest disappointment this time was that originality didn't pay as both didn't qualify for the final. While it's usually rock which can been seen as a risky choice, this time it appeared to be electro as Germany and United Kingdom also did'nt survive.

Another interesting point this time was the number of songs, sung in one of their official languages. For the first time we had Maltese, in a song whose lyrics were written by Deo, the Maltese player himself, India, for a first participation, went for a mix of Hindi and English, and finally only 8 countries decided not to choose one of their national languages. Amongst them, only Germany didn't qualify... Is it a clue ? Well maybe.

After the qualifying round, 23 countries went to the final. For the first time, defending champion, this time the United States of America, was not one of the finalists. With only nine songs in English in the final, it was possible again to have a winner in another language. This only happened two times before, with Greece in WSC .01 and Russia in WSC .05. At the beginning of the live coverage, it appeared that the results would be close as several countries took the lead, Romania and Italy, for example. Other did show they had to be taken seriously like Monaco and Australia, but it finally ended with Iceland which kept the lead untill the end with a comfortable advance.

So it was time for Iceland to win, which seemed to make everyone happy here, with the song Hún performed by Skítamórall. Runnur up was Australia and bronze medal went to Monaco.

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THE WINNER

Country: Iceland
Artist(s): Skítamórall
Song: Hún

Skítamórall, one of Iceland's most popular groups, was founded in 1995. With Gunnar Ólason and Einar Ágúst as the leading vocalists, they appeared in 1995 with their debut "Súper" for the first time in the Icelandic music scene. Although this longplayer wasn't the big breakthrough, just like the following "Tjútt" (1997) they earned a lot of respect. The commercial success started with Nákvæmlega in 1998 and ""Skítamórall"" in 1999. In 2003 the band released their best-of "Skímó - Það besta frá Skítamóral" and in 2005, they released a new album called "Má ég sjá".