![\"\"](\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/dutch\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/11\/2019\/05\/Eurovision-350x233.jpg\")
<\/a>Photo taken by Daniel Kruczynski found on Flickr.com with license CC BY-SA 2.0<\/p><\/div>\n
What is Eurovision?<\/h3>\n
Eurovision began in 1956 as way bring together the continent after the oorlogen<\/em> or wars. The first show was held in Switzerland and it was a huge experiment<\/em> considering live TV was not really common, let alone among so many countries. At first, the show was called Eurovision Song Contest Gran Prix, but later it was shortened to just Eurovision Song Contest. Eurovision has grown to be the longest running television shows and one of the most watched non-athletic event in the world.<\/p>\n Although the event began as a Europe-only event, it has somewhat expanded over the years. Any member of the European Broadcast Area who pays a participant fee can participate. Non-European countries who have sent a competitor include Turkey (transcontinental), Israel, Cyprus, Armenia, Australia, Morocco, Russia (transcontinental), among others.<\/p>\n All submitted songs must have both music and lyrics and the singing has to be live. There have been some beperkingen<\/em> or restrictions about language, but nowadays, songs can be in any language. English has become the most common language in use although many countries still use their own.<\/p>\n Stemming <\/em>or voting is done two ways. First, there is a selected jury who awards punten <\/em>or points to each of the participants. Secondly, viewers can submit their vote via the app or with an SMS, however, they are not allowed to vote for their own country. This reduces the advantage of the most\u00a0bevolkte<\/em> or populated countries (Germany, France, UK, Australia, Russia). Since the popular voting began, there has been a backup jury in place just in case of a malfunction.<\/p>\n This year, the show was hosted in Tel Aviv since Israel won Eurovision 2018. The theme of this year was “Dare to Dream!” and there were many events organised in Israel, including beach watching parties, related to Eurovision.<\/p>\n During the first halve finale<\/em> or semi-finals, Australia was the big winner of the night followed by Czech Republic and Iceland. The second semi-finals saw the Netherlands, North Macedonia and Sweden as the big winners. The finale<\/em> was won by the Dutch singer Duncan Laurence with the song “Arcade” followed by Italy and Russia. You can see Duncan’s performance in this video from the Eurovision YouTube channel<\/a>. The video below shows the warm welcome Duncan Laurence received at Schiphol after the big win. Some of the fans at the airport compared Duncan’s win to winning the WK or world cup.<\/p>\nWho and how can you participate?<\/h3>\n
Voting<\/h3>\n
Eurovision 2019<\/h3>\n