The Eurovision Song Contest is the most watched musical event on the planet, with an estimated audience of 163 million people worldwide.
It gave birth to ABBA and Riverdance – and Celine Dion won the competition singing in French for Switzerland in 1988, establishing herself as a major artist in the process.
Winning songs have gone to No.1 in singles charts all over the world, including the United States. Love it or loathe it, it has contributed significantly to our cultural, social, economic and political landscape.
In recent weeks the President of Israel, Isaac Herzog, intervened and asked that the writers of the song selected to represent Israel in this year’s competition change the lyrics to prevent it from being excluded from the competition.
15,000 Irish artists have signed a petition asking for Israel to be excluded from Eurovision 2024. There are similar petitions active in Iceland, Norway, Denmark, Finland, the UK.
Several artists competing in Eurovision 2024 have broken rank and asked that Israel be excluded from the competition, as Russia has been since 2022.
Why do people care so much about Eurovision? Why would the president of a country ask an artist to change lyrics in a song contest? And can organisers and artists learn anything from the Irish artists who boycotted SXSW?
Mark Graham is a Music Lecturer at SETU (and a podcaster) and he spoke to 'Deise Today' this morning (Wednesday) about the issues.
You can listen back to his chat with Damien by clicking on the image above...
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