Adult passions at a children’s show

This year the Junior Eurovision Song Contest took place in Bucharest, Romania. Among the winners were the Russian duet of Masha and Nastia Tolmachev, who performed “Spring Jazz” and the Belarusian singer Andrei Kunets, who performed “A New Day.” The 14-year-old Ukrainian contestant, Nazar Sliusarchuk from Ternopil oblast, shared eighth place with his Cypriot counterpart.

What happened behind the scenes? Nazar put on a great show, but his nervousness and general physical condition took their toll, so his performance was not as expressive as it could have been. There was an accident during one of his rehearsals. A girl from the ballet group Vostorg fell and broke her leg. She had surgery, but the choreographic accompaniment to Nazar’s number “Rock’n’Roll Boy” had to be replaced. Naturally, this had an impact on our young contestant.

“This was the first time that Ukraine took part in the children’s song contest Eurovision 2006,” Ukrainian National Television Company President Vitalii Pavlenko told The Day. “We selected and started training the best contestant half a year before the concert in Bucharest. We wanted him to be appreciated not only by experts in singing, choreography, and stage presence, but above all by the audience. The winner is chosen by television viewers, who vote during the competition. That was why we chose this approach. During the concert at the national finals Nazar obtained the largest number of votes. Our audiences made their choice, and the contest was as transparent as possible. All the contestants competed on equal terms. We are generally satisfied with the result because we succeeded in raising our country and its performers to a higher level of representation in this international televised contest that attracts audiences all over Europe.”

However, the number of scandals during the Children’s Eurovision 2006 matched those seen during adult competitions. The organizers’ troubles began even before the competition. Norway, Denmark, and Sweden refused to participate, hinting at the “dominance of commercialism” in the preparation and conduct of the competition (Sweden later reconsidered). Latvia and the UK also withdrew their contestants. Then there was a misunderstanding with Pedro Madeira from Portugal. His song turned out to have been written by a professional composer, which is against the rules and the idea behind the competition. Serbia’s representatives, “The Fearless Teachers,” ignored the rule that songs must be performed in the competitor’s national language and tried to impress the audience with multilingual couplets, with only the chorus sung in Serbian.

It is anyone’s guess how this situation will affect Eurovision 2007 scheduled for Rotterdam (the Netherlands). But that is a problem for adults to solve. Favorites appeared right after the national qualifiers, and the experts’ predictions were a mixed bag. Thor, the nine-year-old contestant from Belgium, performed the merriest song with an “international” refrain, and his number was the most popular. The Croatian contestant scored the highest number of points: 10. For the first time at this competition, the Romanian group, New Star Music, put on a costume show: Spiderman, Harry Potter, and Peter Pan. Costumes notwithstanding, the children sang quite well.

This year Spain, the winner of Eurovision 2004, was represented by 14-year-old Dani, who sang “I’m Giving You My Voice,” which won him fourth place. A girl from Macedonia, Zana Aliu, wrote two songs. Molly Sanden from Sweden, who sang “The Best That Can Be Achieved,” impressed the audience with her strong voice and professional poise usually found in adult performers.” This young star received high marks from viewers in almost every country, and placed third.

The harmony of songs unites the world. It makes us forget about our worries as we enjoy listening to the voices of European children. Junior Eurovision 2006 was broadcast by the 1st National Channel. There were no borders, at least not on the television airwaves.