Eurovision 2015 - 60th Anniversary Edition

Reminds me of a modern version of 1998!

I didn't like 1998's set. I think it just seemed a massive step backwards from Dublin, and it felt like it was in TVC, not the NIA. In many ways I think Dublin 1997 set the foundation stones for the bigger shows of the 2000s, it's just that Birmingham 1998 and Jerusalem 1999 were a bit, well, meh.

Likewise, this feels like it's being set up at Fountain Studios. I know the EBU have wanted to downsize recently but is feels so... Small. Copenhagen and Malmo were smaller shows compared to some we had since Copenhagen 2001 at Parken but they looked great on screen and were world class productions.

I know what you mean - it was a very simple set in Birmingham. However the camera scripting was great - and the music production really well done - so I can forgive it a simpler set.


Jerusalem suffered from using LED a little bit before it was really ready, and having a very small venue. It also suffered in comparison to 1998 in production terms. The coverage just really wasn't as good.


Well the set is a Florian Wieder design isn't it - he does X Factor at Fountain...



Parken was arguably too big. I don't think it came over that well on-screen. Globen the year before was definitely the game changer, and the Nordic countries dominated the ESC (either by hosting or effectively host-broadcasting) pretty much ever since (2006 and 2011 are the obvious exceptions where the Germans hosted or effectively host-broadcasted?)

Think the days of the orchestra are dead, thankfully. I never liked the orchestra. Pop rarely sounds good with an orchestra.

Actually, I think it's fair to say that some pop doesn't sound good with an orchestra (Euphoria for example), but a lot of the recent entires (and even some winners) would have been amazing with an orchestra (Rise Like a Pheonix for example). Towards the end of the orchestra's regular use, it was an option for a country to use, some used it to very good effect enhancing their entry, while others used a backing track and nothing from the orchestra.

That said, much as I think a live band would add a great deal to the contest, it might be an extravagance the majority of EBU members couldn't justify. And has been previously mentioned, music TV coverage can now be slaved to the timecodes of the backing track, meaning that camera moves, vision mixing etc can be preprogrammed and entirely automated. That's a lot harder to achieve if there's a live band (though possibly click tracks could be an option).

By way of a couple of examples, here's a great orchestral arrangement used in 1993 by Slovenia. A pretty average song made much better by the orchestral arrangement (but let down a bit by some poor camera angles IMO)


And from the same contest a dance track frankly ruined by a brassy orchestral mess and some ludicrous dancing:


However, imagine, just imagine, how great this would have been with an orchestra:

You can watch live coverage of today's 60th Anniversary conference at the link below:

http://www.eurovision.tv/page/webtv?program=129423

Hopefully there will be a chance to watch the covearge back at a better time.

First video of the stage in action contained in this report:

http://mobil.krone.at/phone/kmm__1/story_id__449550/sendung_id__32/story.phtml

Despite being initially optimistic and positive I have to say that the arena and stage do indeed look tiny!

Mel Giedroyc to join Scott Mills for the semi finals.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/latestnews/2015/bbcthreeevpresenters?ns_mchannel=social&ns_campaign=bbc_press_office&ns_source=twitter&ns_linkname=corporate

Loving this news - 1) She's funny, 2) She does actually like the Contest, AFAIK, and best of all, 3) She's not that awful Whitmore woman.

I may not always like what BBC Three do with the semis, but if they must have such a heavy presence on them, better someone like Mel

I'm not sure whether that is a good choice or not, presumably since this is the first time she covered anything to do with Eurovision. I do think she'll be funny, because she is, but I hope she has the Eurovision knowledge and fun!

Not a bad choice, and let's be fair Mills has improved massively from his car crash debut in Dusseldorf. I watched last year on Three instead of RTE for the first time since then and it wasn't that bad .

They just need to know when to shut up, really - something which I've really appreciated at the Grand Final since Norton took over. A refreshing change from the bad old days of Wogan.