Eurovision Song Contest 2004
The Eurovision Song Contest 2004 was the 49th edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. It took place in Istanbul, Turkey, following Sertab Erener's win at the contest in Riga, Latvia with the song "Everyway That I Can". It was the first time Turkey had hosted the contest - 29 years after the country made its debut. Organised by the European Broadcasting Union and host broadcaster Turkish Radio and Television Corporation, the contest was held at the Abdi İpekçi Arena, and consisted of a semi-final on 12 May, and the final on 15 May 2004. The two live shows were hosted by Korhan Abay and Meltem Cumbul.
It was the first Eurovision Song Contest held in a transcontinental country and city, in a Muslims-majority country and in Turkic language-speaking country.
Thirty-six countries participated in the contest, beating the record of twenty-six in the previous edition. Albania, Andorra, Belarus and Serbia and Montenegro took part for the first time this year. The old relegation system was replaced with a semi-final format. This was done in order to accommodate the increasing number of countries who wished to participate. The new format allowed all countries to participate every year, rather than being forced to sit out per the relegation rules, which had been the standard since. Because of this, Denmark, Finland, Lithuania, Macedonia, Monaco and Switzerland all returned to the contest.
The winner was Ukraine with the song "Wild Dances", performed by Ruslana who wrote it with Oleksandr Ksenofontov. This was Ukraine's first victory in the contest, after only 1 year of participation. Serbia and Montenegro, Greece, Turkey and Cyprus rounded out the top five.
This year was the first time in which a non-winning entry scored over 200 points. Prior to this contest, only the winning entries in 1994 and 1997 had passed this mark. In this contest, the top 3 songs all got over 200 points.
Location
The contest was held in Istanbul following Turkey's victory in the contest in Riga, Latvia with Sertab Erener's "Everyway That I Can". Originally the Mydonose Showland was chosen by TRT to host the event, but was changed to the Abdi İpekçi Arena as the contest approached due to its bigger capacity. Korhan Abay and Meltem Cumbul were presenters of the show.In the semi-final and the final, Meltem Cumbul warmed up the audience with a sing-a-long of Eurovision classic "Nel blu dipinto di blu ", originally by Domenico Modugno. Sertab Erener returned to the stage in the final to perform "Everyway That I Can", the 2003 winning song, and one of her new songs called "Leave". Sertab also interviewed contestants in the green room. The Turkish dance ensemble Fire of Anatolia performed as the interval act. An official CD was released and, for the first time, the entire contest was released on DVD which included the Semi-final and the Grand Final.
Format
Firsts
The contest's new official generic logo was used for the first time this year, with the heart-shaped flag in the centre due to be changed for future contests. The slogan for Istanbul's contest was "Under The Same Sky", which communicated the importance of a united Europe and Turkish integration.This year was also notable as it was the first year that Turkey voted for Cyprus and the second year in a row that Cyprus voted for Turkey. Nevertheless, in a move that angered some Cypriots, when the country presented its votes no map of the island was shown. This was due to Turkey's recognition of the northern half of the island as an independent republic. It is likely Turkey pulled out of showing the map because it would have only highlighted the southern portion of the island, and thus angered the international community.
This was also the first year that the scores were only re-read by the hosts in one language. Before 2004 every point was repeated in French and English, but due to 36 countries voting, and more in years to come, in 2004 to save time the hosts only re-read each score in one language. This was in the opposite of the original country representative spoke in.
Voting structure
Every country in the competition, including those who did not qualify for the final, were allowed to vote for other countries. After all performances were completed, each country opened their phone lines to allow their viewers to vote for their favourite song. Voting for the country in which you are situated is not allowed, however. Each country awarded points based on the number of votes cast for each song: the song which received the most viewer votes was awarded 12 points, the second 10 points, the third 8 points and then 7, 6, 5, etc. down to 1.In the event of a tie, the number of countries to vote for the tying songs would be counted, and the song having the most countries awarding points to it, would be the winner. In the event of a further tie, then the previously used method of counting back on the number of 12 points, 10 points etc., would be used to find an eventual winner.
Incidents
Just before the Slovenian entry was about to be performed, the Turkish broadcaster accidentally took a commercial break which meant the Slovenian song was not heard by Turkish viewers and consequently, Turkey gave no votes for the song. There were technical problems when in a short hiatus halfway through the songs,, the hosts tried to contact various parties in Europe. They tried contacting Germany, Spain and Turkey, but in the end were only able to get a response from Germany. During the Romanian postcard introduction, the information for the Romanian entry appeared on the screen, but was quickly taken away. A final minor hiccup occurred when, on her way to present the winner the trophy, Sertab Erener got her shoe stuck in a speaker grill by the side of the stage and had to be freed by stagehands. However this did not delay proceedings, and other than the above the show ran smoothly.An hour after the semi-final had been aired, the European Broadcasting Union discovered that there had been problems with the vote counting in Monaco and Croatia. Digame, an affiliate of Deutsche Telekom, who had been responsible for processing all the votes, reported that they had encountered problems with their calculation software, and there was a problem with text message voting in Croatia. When the votes were counted, results showed that Croatia had awarded themselves 4 points, which is against Eurovision rules. Later, an official EBU statement read that there had been technical problems at the side of the Croatian mobile service provider, who neglected to delete the illegal votes from the results. Consequently, some votes were not counted in the results announced at the end of the broadcast of the semi-final. When the results were corrected to include these additional votes, they were found not to have affected which countries had qualified for the Final.
Participating countries
This year's Eurovision contest was the first to be a two-day event, with one qualifying round held on a Wednesday and the grand final held on the following Saturday. Under this new format, byes into the final were given to the 'Big 4';,, and the and the ten highest placed finishers in the contest.,, and participated in the Contest for the first time, with returning after a 25-year absence. were due to return after an absence of 11 years, but later pulled out after money issues arose between RTL and the EBU.
All participating countries had the right to vote in both the qualifying round and the grand final. This was the first year in which all 36 participating countries voted based on a public phone vote. However, and did not broadcast the semi-final and therefore did not give votes for it like the other thirty-three countries. In Belgium, the French-language RTBF did not broadcast the semi-final, but the Dutch-language VRT did.
Results
Semi-final
The semi-final was held on 12 May 2004 at 21:00. 22 countries performed and all participants voted except France, Poland and Russia. This was the first ever semi-final in Eurovision history.Shaded countries qualified for the Eurovision Final
| Draw | Country | Artist | Song | Language | Place | Points |
| 01 | Jari Sillanpää | "Takes 2 to Tango" | English | 14 | 51 | |
| 02 | Aleksandra and Konstantin | "My Galileo" | English | 19 | 10 | |
| 03 | Piero Esteriore & The MusicStars | "Celebrate" | English | 22 | 0 | |
| 04 | Fomins and Kleins | "Dziesma par laimi" | Latvian | 17 | 23 | |
| 05 | David D'Or | "Leha'amin" | Hebrew, English | 11 | 57 | |
| 06 | Marta Roure | "Jugarem a estimar-nos" | Catalan | 18 | 12 | |
| 07 | Sofia Vitória | "Foi magia" | Portuguese | 15 | 38 | |
| 08 | Julie and Ludwig | "On Again... Off Again" | English | 8 | 74 | |
| 09 | Maryon | "Notre planète" | French | 19 | 10 | |
| 10 | Sakis Rouvas | "Shake It" | English | 3 | 238 | |
| 11 | Ruslana | "Wild Dances" | English, Ukrainian | 2 | 256 | |
| 12 | Linas and Simona | "What's Happened to Your Love?" | English | 16 | 26 | |
| 13 | Anjeza Shahini | "The Image of You" | English | 4 | 167 | |
| 14 | Lisa Andreas | "Stronger Every Minute" | English | 5 | 149 | |
| 15 | Toše Proeski | "Life" | English | 10 | 71 | |
| 16 | Platin | "Stay Forever" | English | 21 | 5 | |
| 17 | Neiokõsõ | "Tii" | Võro | 11 | 57 | |
| 18 | Ivan Mikulić | "You Are the Only One" | English | 9 | 72 | |
| 19 | Tomas Thordarson | "Shame on You" | English | 13 | 56 | |
| 20 | Željko Joksimović & Ad-Hoc Orchestra | "Lane moje" | Serbian | 1 | 263 | |
| 21 | Deen | "In the Disco" | English | 7 | 133 | |
| 22 | Re-Union | "Without You" | English | 6 | 146 |
A new ABBA video was shown in the semi-final, briefly outlining how ABBA started and what the response was of the first record company they approached. It featured small puppets of the band performing snippets of their songs and featured Rik Mayall as the record company manager. This was cut from the Eurovision Song Contest DVD and released separately. References to the video that were made running up to the showing of it were also cut.
Final
The finalists were:- the four automatic qualifiers France, Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom;
- the top 10 countries from the 2003 contest ;
- the top 10 countries from the 2004 semi-final.
Countries in bold automatically qualified for the Eurovision Song Contest 2005 Final.
| Draw | Country | Artist | Song | Language | Place | Points |
| 01 | ' | Ramón | "Para llenarme de ti" | Spanish | 10 | 87 |
| 02 | Tie Break | "Du bist" | German | 21 | 9 | |
| 03 | Knut Anders Sørum | "High" | English | 24 | 3 | |
| 04 | ' | Jonatan Cerrada | "À chaque pas" | French, Spanish | 15 | 40 |
| 05 | ' | Željko Joksimović & Ad-Hoc Orchestra | "Lane moje" | Serbian | 2 | 263 |
| 06 | ' | Julie and Ludwig | "On Again... Off Again" | English | 12 | 50 |
| 07 | Re-Union | "Without You" | English | 20 | 11 | |
| 08 | ' | Max | "Can't Wait Until Tonight" | English, Turkish | 8 | 93 |
| 09 | ' | Anjeza Shahini | "The Image of You" | English | 7 | 106 |
| 10 | Ruslana | "Wild Dances" | English, Ukrainian | 1 | 280 | |
| 11 | Ivan Mikulić | "You Are the Only One" | English | 12 | 50 | |
| 12 | ' | Deen | "In the Disco" | English | 9 | 91 |
| 13 | Xandee | "1 Life" | English | 22 | 7 | |
| 14 | ' | Julia Savicheva | "Believe Me" | English | 11 | 67 |
| 15 | Toše Proeski | "Life" | English | 14 | 47 | |
| 16 | ' | Sakis Rouvas | "Shake It" | English | 3 | 252 |
| 17 | Jónsi | "Heaven" | English | 19 | 16 | |
| 18 | Chris Doran | "If My World Stopped Turning" | English | 22 | 7 | |
| 19 | Blue Café | "Love Song" | English, Spanish | 17 | 27 | |
| 20 | ' | James Fox | "Hold On to Our Love" | English | 16 | 29 |
| 21 | ' | Lisa Andreas | "Stronger Every Minute" | English | 5 | 170 |
| 22 | ' | Athena | "For Real" | English | 4 | 195 |
| 23 | Sanda | "I Admit" | English | 18 | 18 | |
| 24 | Lena Philipsson | "It Hurts" | English | 5 | 170 |
Scoreboard
Semi-final
12 points
Below is a summary of all 12 points in the semi-final:| N. | Contestant | Voting nation |
| 9 | ' | Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Germany, Netherlands, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine |
| 7 | ' | Albania, Cyprus, Israel, Malta, Romania, Turkey, United Kingdom |
| 4 | ' | Belarus, Estonia, Lithuania, Portugal |
| 2 | - | - |
| 2 | ' | Denmark, Norway |
| 2 | ' | Greece, Monaco |
| 2 | Finland, Latvia | |
| 2 | ' | Belgium, Ireland |
| 1 | - | - |
| 1 | ' | Macedonia |
| 1 | Spain | |
| 1 | Iceland | |
| 1 | ' | Serbia and Montenegro |
| 1 | Andorra |
Final
12 points
Below is a summary of all 12 points in the final:| N. | Contestant | Voting nation |
| 8 | Estonia, Israel, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Turkey | |
| 7 | Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Sweden, Switzerland, Slovenia, Ukraine | |
| 5 | Albania, Cyprus, Malta, Romania, United Kingdom | |
| 4 | Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Norway | |
| 4 | Belgium, Germany, France, Netherlands | |
| 2 | Andorra, Portugal | |
| 1 | Macedonia | |
| 1 | Greece | |
| 1 | Monaco | |
| 1 | Spain | |
| 1 | Serbia and Montenegro | |
| 1 | Belarus |
Other awards
AP Awards
Marcel Bezençon Awards
The Marcel Bezençon Awards were first handed out during the Eurovision Song Contest 2002 in Tallinn, Estonia honoringthe best competing songs in the final. Founded by Christer Björkman and Richard Herrey, the awards are named after the creator of the annual competition, Marcel Bezençon. The awards are divided into 3 categories: Press Award, Artistic Award, and Composer Award.
| Category | Country | Song | Performer | Composer | Final | Points |
| Artistic Award | "Wild Dances" | Ruslana | Oleksandr Ksenofontov Ruslana Lyzhychko | 1 | 280 | |
| Composer Award | "Stronger Every Minute" | Lisa Andreas | Mike Konnaris | 5 | 170 | |
| Press Award | "Lane moje" | Željko Joksimović | Željko Joksimović | 2 | 263 |
Commentators and spokespersons
Commentators
Participating countries
Non-participating countries
- – Unknown
- – Des Mangan
- – Unknown
- –
- – Unknown
Spokespersons
- – Pati Molné
- – Zhani Ciko
- – Dodo Roščić
- – Mija Martina
- – Martine Prenen
- – Denis Kurian
- – Emel Aykanat
- – Nataša Miljković
- – Loukas Hamatsos
- – Thomas Anders
- – Camilla Ottesen
- – Maarja-Liis Ilus
- – Anne Igartiburu
- – Anna Stenlund
- – Alex Taylor
- – Lorraine Kelly
- – Alexis Kostalas
- – Barbara Kolar
- – Johnny Logan
- – Merav Miller
- – Sigrún Ósk Kristjánsdóttir
- – Rolandas Vilkončius
- – Lauris Reiniks
- – Anne Allegrini
- – Claire Agius
- – Karolina Petkovska
- – Esther Hart
- – Ingvild Helljesen
- – Maciej Orłoś
- – Isabel Angelino
- – Andreea Marin
- – Yana Churikova
- – Jovan Radomir
- – Peter Poles
- – Meltem Ersan Yazgan
- – Pavlo Shylko
Official album