The recent week was probably one of the craziest ones in our Eurovision calendars this year, and we can’t blame you if you feel like you’ve seen all – and nothing – at once.

Time to look back!

First things first: The most hours of show production last week came from the small nation of San Marino. On seven (!) consecutive nights, the new national final format – Una voce per San Marino – was aired to more or less local TVs, and probably even more people watched from their computers all over the world. The quest to find the Sammarinese entrant culminated in a grand final on Saturday night, which not only deserved its place as the subject of our main chat, but even hit the Top 10 of the worldwide Twitter trends. The stars of the show were Senhit (co-host), Valentina Monetta (interval act), Al Bano (interval act), and the many contestants who either emerged from the emerging artists competition, or were set for the final as established artists. In the end, the winner was no big surprise: Achille Lauro, no stranger to Sanremo viewers, won and thus will represent the larger of the two enclaves that lie within the artist’s home country, Italy, with the song “Stripper“. We are happy that San Marino has announced it will keep its new-found format for the future, and wish them all the best for it!

Before we now move on to the many shows from Saturday night, let’s look at some of the smaller and bigger bits of news. First, we have to learn how to reproduce a new letter, since Nadir Rüstəmli was announced to represent Azerbaijan in Turin. The French songs were released, Ukraine’s Alina Pash withdrew from Eurovision in the context of the accusations against her, and the stage design was presented to the public, triggering memories of 1979 (and 1999, to some extent).

photo: FRANCESCA MONTINARO

Malta took its time from Thursday night to Friday night to cut down 22 artists to 16 – and after a really entertaining and heartwarming retro night, they made the contest even more exciting by letting the televoters decide who gets a wildcard. A blessing in disguise for Jessika: She was the lucky one that the Maltese televoters wanted to see most in Saturday’s final, in which she dramatically came last with 1 single point (from the televoters). What a rollercoaster ride. Keep trying, Jessika, if you read this. We were thinking of you. Oh yes, of course MESC also saw a winner in the end: Emma Muscat will represent the island nation with the song “Out of Sight“.

The other highlights from Saturday night included Slovenia’s EMA (sending LPS with “Disko” to Eurovision), Croatia’s Dora (won by Mia Dimšić – “Guilty Pleasure“), and Norway’s MGP (Subwoolfer won with their entry “Give That Wolf A Banana“). Sweden had Anders Bagge and Faith Kakembo qualifying, sending Lisa Miskovsky to the “semifinal” due to what might be an irregularity in the voting, which SVT however denies. And then, of course, there was Poland, which had Krystian Ochman’s “River” as the more or less obvious winner – on the opposite end of the table from former Eurovision artist Lidia Kopania and her noteworthy interpretation of “Why Does It Hurt“.

Sunday finally saw the big launch of SongHunt 2022, escgo!’s own quest to find the best song of the national final season (except the ones that actually go to Eurovision). Semi-final 1 is open until Saturday, 21:00 CET, and awaits your votes here!