Kaliopi and her Fan Art Juries
have found their winners!
This wonderful lady kicked off this week's second hour of "Let Me Be The One" with her 2016 North Macedonian entry, "Dona", but it was "Crno i belo" that inspired the overall winner of the "Kaliopi Fan Art" competition that I covered in some detail in show 88. As a recap, Kaliopi hoped that KFA, as the official shorthand goes, would help her
The competition itself had vocal cover, instrumental cover, dance, drawing and most original categories to enter and each of those had a top three:
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The winners will be getting prizes such as online singing lessons, the opportunity to play at her concerts, participating in an upcoming video, preparing a cover for her single, being part of an exhibition of paintings and visiting a music workshop. It was a nice touch that not only would the overall winner be visiting Kaliopi in North Macedonia to hang out with her for a weekend but also giving her younger fans the opportunity to meet her at home! As for that overall winner, it was from the Instrumental cover section and as pictures speak louder than words, here is the video from Viktorija Milosevic:
Nicely put together, with lots of focus on the winner and a nice look at Kaliopi's living room with her band and her singing "Crno i belo"! I am sure that when the meets with this incredible singer happen, they will appear on her social media and it will give me another opportunity to play another track from this wonderful singer's back catalogue - perhaps "Samo ti" from 1996? "Dona" was track 12 this week on the show - what else was on the playlist?
So you can see it is a mix of old and new - if you missed the live show, here is the place to click and listen:
Now for an apology - for the first time ever on 'Let Me Be The One', I announced a song with the wrong song title and details! The reason was that I have a build-up of new releases and two of them were from Dina Garipova, the Russian artist who came 5th in 2013. The track I played on the show was called "Udivitelnyy" and it is correct on the playlist here and on Mixcloud, so she gets paid royalties she will be due for it being played on this show. However, because I am pre-recording and working from notes, I still had the information for her other song "Ay, bylbylym" in front of me and that is why I called the song by that name and talked about that one instead. This wouldn't have happened if I was broadcasting live! To make amends, I will be playing BOTH of Dina's songs next week on show 97. I'll then be happy that I have corrected my error and I assume that Dina will be too, what with the extra coverage...
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We are now well into June and there isn't a huge amount of current news around, all bar poor Sandro NOT getting the nod for 2021, effectively being the first artist to be actively ruled out of next year's Contest. I felt that it was only right to have him on the show at least one more time, although the Q Sessions did provide me with the opportunity to chat about him twice:
As I said on the show, I am praying that Inis Neziri gives FiK another go so we can all see her at Eurovision. Perhaps she can add to the New Wave and Golden Stag trophies she has behind her! Two other songs this week in the Q Sessions were connected to other tracks on the show - Demy did an beautiful acoustic version of her Eurovision song in Kyiv:
The third one was a duet between Sakis Rouvas, who you heard sing "I Mesa Mou Thalassa" on the show, and Stefania, who has featured a lot in these sessions, solo or in duets:
An excellent series of videos and if you want to catch all of the Q Sessions, excellently arranged by Dimitris Kontopoulos, then you can find the playlist here. It has helped keep the profile of Stefania high, at least within Greece (and I am sure in The Netherlands, her home nation, too) and it wouldn't surprise me if she became one of the favourites at Eurovision 2021, purely because there is now obviously a professional 'movement' behind her, with her being linked, mentored even, by these top stars and producers in Greece. As for the rest of the show, the other matter that I said that I would flag up was the interview with Diodato picked out for me by Donna and that is here.
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Show 97 has no massive surprises yet planned and it might be more heavily slanted towards newish releases again (Dina Garipova getting two goes!), as I still have lots in line saved up over the past four or so weeks! There is one announcement that will be part of the news next week and that involves me and the image above. What is it all about? I'll tell you more about it on show 97 but let's just say that I might have to put "radio broadcaster and Eurovision journalist" on my CV now, as that is how I am described by the organisers! If that isn't enough, these two singers will definitely be on the show:
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"keep in touch with her audience and give them a ray of light during this time of general crisis...
through this project, my fans expressed their creative skills and talents."
through this project, my fans expressed their creative skills and talents."
The competition itself had vocal cover, instrumental cover, dance, drawing and most original categories to enter and each of those had a top three:
Nicely put together, with lots of focus on the winner and a nice look at Kaliopi's living room with her band and her singing "Crno i belo"! I am sure that when the meets with this incredible singer happen, they will appear on her social media and it will give me another opportunity to play another track from this wonderful singer's back catalogue - perhaps "Samo ti" from 1996? "Dona" was track 12 this week on the show - what else was on the playlist?
"Running" - Sandro
"Hold Me" - Farid Mammadov
"Viszlát Nyár" - AWS
"Eres tú" - Mocedades
"Controvento" - Arisa
"This Is Love" - Demy
"No One" - Maja Keuc
"Get You" - Alexey Vorobyov
"Sweet People" - Alyosha
"Amen!" - Krista Siegfrids
"Higher Ground" - Rasmussen
"Dona" - Kaliopi
"I Mesa Mou Thalassa" - Sakis Rouvas
"Í nótt" - Eivør Pálsdóttir
"Un'altra estate" - Diodato
"1, 2, Miss You" - Blanche
"Wrong Direction" - Ilse DeLange & Michael Schulte
"This Is Not Forever" - Kate Miller-Heidke
"Udivitelnyy" - Dina Garipova
"Mila Mou" - Helena Paparizou
"Senses" - Leea Nanos
"Don't Touch Me" - Elis Mraz
"Let Me Be The One" - The Shadows
So you can see it is a mix of old and new - if you missed the live show, here is the place to click and listen:
Now for an apology - for the first time ever on 'Let Me Be The One', I announced a song with the wrong song title and details! The reason was that I have a build-up of new releases and two of them were from Dina Garipova, the Russian artist who came 5th in 2013. The track I played on the show was called "Udivitelnyy" and it is correct on the playlist here and on Mixcloud, so she gets paid royalties she will be due for it being played on this show. However, because I am pre-recording and working from notes, I still had the information for her other song "Ay, bylbylym" in front of me and that is why I called the song by that name and talked about that one instead. This wouldn't have happened if I was broadcasting live! To make amends, I will be playing BOTH of Dina's songs next week on show 97. I'll then be happy that I have corrected my error and I assume that Dina will be too, what with the extra coverage...
As I said on the show, I am praying that Inis Neziri gives FiK another go so we can all see her at Eurovision. Perhaps she can add to the New Wave and Golden Stag trophies she has behind her! Two other songs this week in the Q Sessions were connected to other tracks on the show - Demy did an beautiful acoustic version of her Eurovision song in Kyiv:
The third one was a duet between Sakis Rouvas, who you heard sing "I Mesa Mou Thalassa" on the show, and Stefania, who has featured a lot in these sessions, solo or in duets:
An excellent series of videos and if you want to catch all of the Q Sessions, excellently arranged by Dimitris Kontopoulos, then you can find the playlist here. It has helped keep the profile of Stefania high, at least within Greece (and I am sure in The Netherlands, her home nation, too) and it wouldn't surprise me if she became one of the favourites at Eurovision 2021, purely because there is now obviously a professional 'movement' behind her, with her being linked, mentored even, by these top stars and producers in Greece. As for the rest of the show, the other matter that I said that I would flag up was the interview with Diodato picked out for me by Donna and that is here.
Surely worth a listen
as the traditional post season lull finally kicks in?
as the traditional post season lull finally kicks in?