What is EUROVISION? (Geography Now!) - REACTION 

Actually the mistake you're making is comparing it to a talent show. It's not, the majority of participants are already established singers in their own country. Also, not to say there aren't troll entries, but they're actually not as common as he makes it sound. Most participants are actually pretty good pop songs, and occasionally rock songs, and a whole plethora of other genres. There are some funny songs, but that's not necessarily the same as a troll entry. Måneskin won the show in 2021 against pretty strong competition, and for them it was a way to go from being famous in Italy, to becoming known internationally (or at least all over Europe)

It's NOT a sining contest, it's a SONG contest.

There are quite a few videos out there that explain Eurovision really well. Geography Now! unfortunately isn't one of them. This is so full of mistakes, I don't even know where to begin.

In fact, the "Geography Now" video does a poor job explaining what the Eurovision Song Contest is, primarily because it is based on bizarre entries which are very rare in reality. Someone even less knowledgeable might think that this is a circus, and not a serious, but also entertaining music competition. It also does not emphasize the fact that it is not a SINGING competition, but about choosing the BEST ORIGINAL SONG, and all the participating countries are really trying to send their best ones each year. Very often the songs from the Eurovision Song Contest end up on the charts, occasionally even in the American ones.

As you heard in the video Celine Dion won for Switzerland (she was only known in Canada before), ABBA won with Waterloo for Sweden back in 1974 and Måneskin won for Italy in 2021. Over the years some big names have competed in Eurovision like Cliff Richard, Olivia Newton-John, Lulu and Flo Rida. Several songs from Eurovision were big hits internationally or on Tik Tok/social medias. The Eurovision Song Contest is great fun but it’s taken way more seriously than this video suggests.

ESC is no freak show! Wonderful songs and singers came internationaly became known by participating. The participants now form a kind of international community for two weeks together, singing and making friends 🤗

Most of the artists in Eurovision are well established artists in their home country, some are famous all over Europe when they compete. So it's not really a talent competition because everybody is very talented. It's a competition about who has the best packade of song + artist + staging + choreography.

When Eurovision started, it was literally about the music and lyrics, NOT the artist and/or performance (not that it mattered much; in the 50s and early 60s, performances across the board were pretty much the same everywhere). Also, every country HAD to sing in their own language (with Belgium alternating Flemish and French, and Switzerland switching out Italian, French and German each year). Back in 1974, ABBA from Sweden was the first performer to win with a song not in their native language, but in English. It was the start of their global success. 20 years later, Eurovision once more took place in Ireland, and they had to fill a 7-minute period after all performances were done and they set up voting for the broadcast. During that 7-minute break, a group of Irish dancers, paired with some vocals, performed traditional dances. That group was Riverdance, and totally stole the show. Nobody remembers that year's winners, but Riverdance was another global sensation for years (and is still going ...)

those weird performance makes Eurovision so much fun

What he didn't make clear is that it's not a singing competition - it's all about the song. Obviously if your singer sucks then they're not going to make the song sound good but you're SUPPOSED to vote for the song, not the performance.

Jokey songs often have a better chance than you would imagine. The german entrance at the beginning looked strange at first but made fun of ourselfs and even got 5th place. And the one from Ukraine from the beginning even got second and became a fan favorite.

Rammstein? Germany does not broadcast artists who are not suitable for radio. For this reason, Electric Callboy was also not selected to take part.

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="450">07:30</a> that fall was not an accident, it was on purpose (part of their performance)

Can you react to "Cha Cha Cha" by Käärijä, live from Eurovision 2023? It is the best song of this year Eurovision, and there are similarities with Rammstein!

Important foreword: Eurovision is foremost not a contest of singers, but of songs. <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="130">2:10</a> Eurovision is actually a subsidiary of the European Broadcasting Union, which encompasses currently 69 public broadcasting corporations from 56 countries (plus some associated members) and has like other international organizations its seat in Switzerland, but is not a "Swiss network" as such. The EBU was founded as successor of the International Broadcasting Union which existed 1925-1950; in 1993 the EBU merged with the OIRT, which encompassed the East European broadcasting corporations. It started organizing international broadcasting events back in the mid 1950s. Such broadcasts start generally with that jingle: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-gcHS3cHTV_M.html (showing the logos of the participating national broadcast companies). <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="138">2:18</a> Four hours for the finals only. There are also national auditions and the two semifinals before. <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="164">2:44</a> That is again a bit incorrect. It was not an idea by Switzerland, but of some of the members of the EBU. <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="210">3:30</a> This was the contribution by Ukraine in 2007, interpreted by Verka Seduchka (aka the comedian and TV presenter Andry Danylko) who won 2nd place. <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="250">4:10</a> It is not deliberately, but caused by the national selection procedure on the one hand and by the status of the competition in those countries (and the kind of producers interested in participating) on the other hand. (Rammstein for example was never interested.) During the 1970s and 1980s most countries submitted soft-pop or folk pop songs (a genre called "Schlager" in German speaking and some other countries, which is a nearly literal translation of "hit"), and popularity of the contest dropped in the 1980s and 1990s, before parodists and queer people discovered the contest for themselves. Nowadays it is more like a big crazy party than a serious contest for at least half of the contest fans and performers - but the best and usually most successful songs and performers incorporate both. <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="270">4:30</a> That was in 2000, the performance by Stefan Raab, a very popular late night host and music producer in Germany during the 1990s and early 2000s. The lyrics "Wadde hadde dudde da?" (original video: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-rYamOfnx0GQ.html) are a reminiscence to the "little rabbit" jokes from the 1970s and 1980s. He made the contest popular again in Germany and also produced the German 1998 contribution: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-HPZX7EZIFD0.html (Guildo does like you and sings for you); the 2004 contribution: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-j6jSUb_RvXM.html and the 2010 winner: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-7pL9vdpSvnY.html <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="510">8:30</a> The Heavy Metal group Lordi won the 2006 contest with this song: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-gAh9NRGNhUU.html <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="516">8:36</a> The winning (and bearded) drag queen was Conchita Wurst from Austria with this song: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-SaolVEJEjV4.html - and, oh man, she can sing! <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="595">9:55</a> The US could participate, if they had a public TV broadcast corporation as member or associate of the EBU, and they could even win, if they would send some funny and/or queer performers.

Eurovision is a competition between original songs. Not a talent show. Any artist can compete.

😆😂🤣 No, D. I follow you because I appreciate you very much, I love your irony and your insight, but... you were completely wrong this time. And the boy in the video is the perfect demonstration of why Americans must stay far away from Eurovision: they don't understand its spirit and are looking for a fierce competition where there is above all a desire to have fun together. And by fun I don't mean (or not only) what appears simply funny to Americans, but which usually hides much more (cultural aspects, irony, satire, etc.). Although yes, sometimes there are also things that are just ridiculous and funny... but I don't think the guy in the video identified many of them. Yes, it's true that many states sometimes send weak songs so as not to win, it's true that juries tend to give "political" votes (to make you understand better, I'll give you the example of someone you know: in 2021 Maneskin for juries they were fifth, it was a real avalanche of popular votes that made them come first), but everything is resolved with laughter, teasing and some grumbling, after an evening of semi-global fun shared in the same spirit. Which is a far cry from talent shows or the Olympic 100m final.

I really enjoyed Germany's performance in 2000, it was fun😂

It use to be a composer competition, with live orchestra ( till 1999) and the composer found a person or group to sing their song. Even the great Celine Dion sang 1988 for Switzerland “ Ne partez pas sans moi” ( Don’t leave without me).

The "best way of describing it is to say, it's like the Olympics in singing. For Mostly European countrys.

Eurovision this year will be in May with the semifinals on the 7th and 9th and the final the 11th. I recommend that you watch it! It is a fun show! A lot of good songs this year!

The dancer that fell was on pourpose. They were comedy actors. It was the firs (and last) time thespanish representant was chosen By popular vote, everyone voted for the troll song. 😂

As a European - I always watch the Eurovision Song Contest since the 1970s I have seen it in English. French, German and Finnish on their national broadcasters. My musical tastes do not accord with many performers so it is my foray into a slightly alien world. Just for a bit of background the European Broadcasting Union was set up to enable the sharing of television (and radio) broadcasts around Europe. Remember the French had SECAM, Germany and Britain had PAL and the USA had NTSC and none of these were directly compatible. So the EBU does a lot of work to share the content and develop standards - where everyone now uses DVB-T now. The best piece of music is definitely the Eurovision theme ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-NSIolFvLwXQ.html It is Charpentier's Prelude to the Te Deum - written in 1692!! Here by the way is a slightly better video on the ESC ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-S4RXY_2RnbE.html And you can watch it on the Internet when it comes on in May.

You should react to "The exciting televoting results sequence of Eurovision 2021" (you can find it just like that on youtube) that ends with Italy (represented by Maneskin) winning Eurovision. It's basically when after all the juries from each countries had assigned their points having Switzerland as the momentary winner, they then proceeded to announce the televote results adding the televote points country for country and everyone was shocked because it never happened before that many countries got literally ZERO votes from the televote lol And Maneskin got an insane amount of points from the televote which turned everything around, it's just so fun to see their reaction, Damiano yelling in roman dialect to just tell them the votes when the host was trying to create suspance and then Ethan's face became an iconic meme that night

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="265">4:25</a> that was actually a good performance and finished 5th. I used to look down on eurovision as a contest of just bad music but in recent years as i got older, i got more and more open minded and started to really like eurovision. eurovision to me is a celebration of music, i want to see performances and songs that are so whacky that youd never find it any other way. i still have the image from that midget from last year in my head who was playing the flute while fighting with another artist. i also really love it when artists sing in their native language, were so used to everything being in english, it is very refreshing for me to hear native languages. the second place of last year was really cool and sang in finnish (btw he had a big rammstein tattoo on his chest). that said, the one thing i hate the most about eurovision is my own country, germany. we send THE WORST artists every single year. and its not even whacky or just fun stuff that you can laugh at (those performances usually finish relatively high actually due to the entertainment factor), its just the most generic and boring ass pop music youll ever hear. last year we did send a rock band but quite possibly the most generic rock music youve ever heard. we finished bottom 2 like 7 or 8 times the last 10 years. a performance like at <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="265">4:25</a> would be very welcome in my opinion, at least it stands out, people will remember it, have fun. but the generic pop we send nowadays is so forgettable, youll forget the song 10 seconds after the performance finishes. the people behind the german performances are out of touch people who arent even aware whats popular or what could be good in eurovision. german pop isnt even popular in germany itself anymore. german rap has long overtaken german pop in terms of popularity, we had this big scandal of electric callboy going to eurovision in 2021 i believe. theyve made it public that they applied and their application got rejected for "not being viable for radio" which translated means "your music is too offensive for us old folks".

(10.35) "You cant even take it seriously which make this competition one big fun guff" Well why don't you ask ABBA & Celine Dion what they think of this SONG contest and see what their answer would be. It might surprise you. (Of course have heard of ABBA & Celine Dion - right !!)

In Eurovision you can see people from one country waving the flag of another's and that only happens here. Because the fandom really support the song or the artists they like. Yes, you can also support your own country but it is not frowned upon to support your favorite. I am sure the US can't deal with that because patriotism is stronger. 😅

Not wanting to win is not an option as no one is forcing you to enter to begin with - yes it is expensive to host but it is a HUGE turist magnet as well as prestigious. Ireland is the only one that might have come slightly close in the 90s when they won 4 times is 5 years.😅

Origninally ESC was about the composer of the song. It is not American Idol etrc where singers cover others songs. The song has to be orignial, can not be sung or released before a sertain date before the contest. So no covering Mariah og Whitney here...:) It is the worlds biggest songcontest and TV show, other than sports with about 200 million tv viewers. Airing since 1956.

You can still watch and react… you unfortunately can’t vote but chose your own winner on you channel… it’s a huge spectacle and really fun

The "troll" entry of Germany? Which wasn't a troll entry... That one actually did pretty well. Stefan Raab is a pretty popular person in Germany and everytime he was involved in choosing a performing act, a song or took part in it himself Germany did pretty well. He knows what he's doing xD

About the fun songs, it's mostly not because they don't want to win. It's more that everyone tries everytime to create something new or unique. Because it isn't a singing competition but a SONG COMPETION! It's all about the song and everything is possible, cause no one knows what works. 😜

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="393">6:33</a> 🎶 „Guildo hat euch lieb!“🎵

❤

The channel "Overthinking it" have a bunch of videos analyzing and overthinking previous Eurovision entries, but they also have a few more generally informative videos. "Six Reasons Americans Should Watch Eurovision" ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-SMJUCHuv7pE.html "The Four Ways Eurovision Gets Political" ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-O0QwlZ3VFeQ.html I can recommend both, starting with the top one.

SONG contest

Hi, D.! ....You know that MANESKIN won the Eurovision Songcontest with "Zitti é Buoni"?

Eurovision is a show watched by millions of people. Don't take it seriously, it's just a show.

Hi D. I wanted You to react to this, so You have a basic understanding of eurovision. Because my next reaction requests will be some of the many songs and singers that took part in eurovision. (One You already did - Fance Gall)

Thiis guys description is riddled with inacuracies but the main one is that there is no rule that says the winning country HAS to host next year. Yes they are offered it first and it is kinda traditional but they can decline. We hosted last year instead of Ukraine for obvious reasons, The Netehrlands stepped in when Isreal couldnt host 2 years in a row. In many countries the daft songs have been voted for in the individual countries selections by the public not as some way to avoid winning. the Conest has produced some amazing songs and made stars of some increadible artists. It gave the world ABBA what more can you ask for.

Its NOT just reduced about to have fun. Its a buffer system to vent and prevent a third world war and thats serious matter. The clip the guy showed are not portraiting reality, but 99,9% want to win and all the speeches and presenators , hosts are highly delicate political matter that need to be handled wisely. Of course the guy showed the weirdedsd stuff he could find to get attention. If you have not grown up in Europe, you dont see the parody, satire etc of each participant, the groups or songs need to be analysed in political past and present context. Singing about just alcohol, party for everybody have criticism in them. People dont show up in real life or on stage as blunt, but have a lot of symbolisms. Its not about singing in first place, its about an original song. Each country has a nationalwide competition to choose whom they want to send. If USA participates, its loosing its meaning since its abou preventing World war, not repeating war on european ground, and USA would think its about patriotism, waving flag, USA first, and not think as anti-war, and would take it too far, too serious and think they need to win to brag, to take over, make it a status thing. USA is a highly competitiv society, taking things too seriously and parents would train their kids to perform then participate as adults to win, loosing is not a concept in US upbringing. It would start to ruin the meaning of this event. Also, "cool kids" dont watch it, its more a boomer thing, elderly thing nowadays 😂

True, most of the presented songs in the Geography Now! video suck, but for each song that sucks, there are lots of great, amazing songs.

Poland has won twice in a row but it was eurovision junior ;(

I think this video is already 10 years old... and kinda irrelevant. I wouldn't say that some countries don't want to win the contest. Recient years there are plenty of huge hits and great songs from Eurovision that become worldwide hits.

That's not switzerland how said "lets make a contest" but It was an italian man how want to create this contest based on Sanremo festival .

Hi, it's been a long time since you've done an Italian music reaction. I recommend Angelina Mango "La noia" Eurovision 2024

Perfect summary ! Everyone knew no one said 😂

Eurovision SONG contest! Not singing contest

In France this contest is a kind of joke. Our last winner is Marie Myriam with "l'oiseau et l'enfant" in 1977 ! Since we joke each year about the contestant, how the song is poor and himself too. Eurovision is a tradition and we like it, but nothing to do with music.

12 points from Ukraine

Hey man i just had to comment to say that while this video has some things right, he mostly focuses on the comedic element and presents Eurovision as something mostly silly. While it does have the silly moments it also has quality. Most Eurovision winners become legends in singing like Celine Dion or Abba, the examples are numerous. The voting system is good enough, it is not as complicated or as faulty as he makes it sound, silly songs sometimes do get high but they almost never win, in the nearly 70 years that Eurovision is going on only a handful of these troll songs become winners and even if they did win, instead of them the really good songs are those who became popular, you would not even believe how many legendary songs you heard that have their origins in Eurovision but you just did not know about it, you would be like "hey no wayyyy". Anyways i wanted to point out that it is a really respected song contest with heavy history, it is not just silliness. Finally i wanted to point out that in a just world where art would be the main factor and not politics Diana Ankudinova, your "Egyptian Goddess" would have won at least 3 Eurovisions by now but unfortunately when she reached the age where she was Eligible to represent her country the war with Ukraine broke out so unfortunately Russia has been banned from competing because the whole theme of Eurovision is Antiwar and such, of course i respect the decision, it is the right call but i can not help but be sad that such a huge talent like Diana can not get to this immense event that would surely skyrocket her fame and put her right in the center of the music world map for good.

Great reaction! I my opinion ESC is too much pop music, besides the "trolls". 2 metal bands have won (well, Måneskin, I don't know.. pizza metal?!). Lordi was quite good, though. Finland seems to have the kind of entries that suits me better, like Blind Channel and Kärija (sorry the bad spelling). Yes I know Sweden won 2023 and Finland came 2nd. And yes I'm from Sweden. I still think that Finland should have won... 😉

Please give your reaction to Vanny Vabiola's new cover music video "I Don't Want To Talk About It", just released yesterday.

In my opinion Geography Now is not a go-to channel to learn about Europe. For me he is very much meant for the American consumer only and doesn't care about being accurate in any capacity. That is true for all of his videos I have seen. He also concentrates on more of a negative side to strengthen the american view on other countries as cheesy and not worth to know better. Alone his machine gun way of speaking! 🙄 Not for me anyway.

I would write many of the comments here in exactly the same way. To add something constructive: take a look at the winners over the years, and not just for a few seconds. Ok; looking at the weirdest posts can't hurt either. :- >

It's THE best, most fun song contest in the world. Although, it has become increasingly more political. For example, the UK's 2022 entry Sam Ryder, blew everyone out of the water and, rightfully, won the public vote but lost out to Ukraine in the jury vote 😏

In the early days and until the 1980s (then I stopped watching, I wasn't interested anymore), each countries' participants had to sing in their own languages, and people took it seriously, there were no such buffoons as shown in this video. Abba won for Sweden in 1974 (I think) with the song "Waterloo" (in Swedish), and even some of the songs that didn't win would become hits (another rule was that the songs were sung there for the first time). When I was a kid, everybody would watch the entire contest, it was a big event. Now, nobody really cares anymore.

Wrong video to learn about Eurovision seriously. Very wrong.

It’s just a little program,,,,with an audience of approximately Six Million plus viewers,,,,, and no you don’t have anything like this in that place you live in .

I'm always disappointed when somebody reacts to this video. An American really shouldn't explain Eurovision... There are better videos on RU-vid..

Il y a déjà plusieurs dizaines d’années que je ne regarde plus l’eurovision. Beaucoup de n’importe quoi et le résultat est la plupart du temps politique suivant l’actualité du moment. Sans intérêt, cela rabaisse l’image de l’Europe et elle avait vraiment pas besoin de cela, beaucoup de politique le font déjà très bien.

That's nothing to bother anymore. These days it's just about politics and not about music. 😢

Can anybody make a better video to explain Eurovision, cause this is soo bad! Maybe someone else then an US american, who has no idea about it 🤔

Reract to "When the party's over" by Mustii (this year's entry for Eurovison) ;-)