Mia and Dion are finally on the Eurovision stage tonight, after months of working on their performance. The singers of Burning Daylight have not always had it easy since the announcement of their song: everyone liked them in traditional and social media. The Netherlands is hard on our own entry, but it turns out we are not the only ones.
We actually have something to grumble about our entry every year. At S10 people thought it was very exciting that it was a Dutch song. Albert Verlinde shouted that he would eat his stool if The Common Linnets did well. And when Duncan Laurence was announced, everyone asked the same question: who?
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‘We have seventeen million people who think something about it’
Mia Nicolai and Dion Cooper noticed that too. After their performance in Spain, they received a lot of criticism: Burning Daylight did not come out as cleanly as hoped and they were harshly lashed out at on television, in newspapers and on social media. Nicolai told NU.nl that he certainly felt that they were being dealt with very firmly.
“Being Dutch is really part of someone’s identity. So we have seventeen million people who think something about it. And they feel disappointed in a way or something,” says Cooper. Nicolai: “They feel it personally. Then you become a picture for people. And then you get messages on your Instagram that I sometimes really think: don’t they realize that we can read it?”
The Netherlands thinks something of the Dutch entry, but what about other countries? Are they immediately satisfied in Sweden, Poland or Albania? No, as it turns out when NU.nl speaks with singer Gustaph. On Thursday he will be in the second semi-final, as Belgium’s entry.
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Belgium did have a national selection
Unlike in the Netherlands, a national selection was once again held in Belgium this year. Belgians could vote for their favourite. Gustaph came out as the winner, but narrowly. And so he also had to deal with considerable criticism.
“People said, ‘But I have another favourite, why didn’t it happen?’ I very much understand that people feel that, because that is part of it. Like in football: you choose a team. What I don’t like, and I have said this very clearly on social media, is if people attack me on my sexuality, my appearance and what I wear.”
Further away from the Netherlands, the criticism is also taking on increasingly serious proportions. “The head of delegation of San Marino (a kind of supervisor, ed.) At one point placed a call on social media: can you please stop spouting all this negative criticism, because our artists can no longer handle it”, says Maas.
In Poland it has been rumored for months that Blanka’s win in the national final was punctured: with every message that the Solosinger posts, viewers react indignantly and call her an undeserved winner. And last year, so much criticism was made of singer Ronela from Albania that she broke down at one point. On social media, she was furious about the journalists from her own country.
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Journalists are no longer allowed in the first week of rehearsals
Partly because of what happened to Ronela, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) has decided this year not to allow journalists during the first rehearsals. This way the artists can focus on what really matters: the music.
“I get it, given all the criticism in recent years. Even before an artist on a dress rehearsal (one of the last rehearsals, ed.) participated, they were already written off. And it was said how things should be done differently in the staging. You have to take that away,” says Maas.
It didn’t quite work out: the French La Zarra, the British Mae Muller and our own Mia and Dion have had a hard time in recent months.
According to Gustaph, who has been working as a musician for years and went to the Eurovision Song Contest twice as a background singer, there is only one thing to do. “Sometimes you also have to be able to say: ‘That’s an opinion and that’s an opinion. And that’s good, but I’m going to continue.'”
“Mia and Dion are both very talented vocalists. So we have to give them a chance to be good. And sometimes a mistake is really welcome.”
2023-05-09 03:11:00
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