Financing Success? Think Again…

by Benny Royston 562 views

A look at the fortunes of the 'Big Four' over the last 20 years of Eurovision by one of esctoday's UK editors, Barry Viniker. What is the future of the French power ballad and will France ever open it's doors to Eurovision again? Have Germany dropped the tacky and wacky in favour of something more adult? Will Spain latino to the top? And will the UK ever gain any of it's former glory and rise from the ashes?

France, Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom are known as the �Big Four� of the Eurovision Song Contest. Since relegation was introduced as a means of limiting the number of entries, the Big Four have been guaranteed participation as the largest financial contributing nations to the European Broadcasting Union (EBU).

Despite their useful financial contributions to the Eurovision Song Contest, the same cannot necessarily be said of their musical contributions with just one win between them in the last 20 years � and that was sung by an American. As new entrants to the EU, former soviet republics and former men have taken the crown, the Big Four have thrived in the modern Eurovision world like Eskimos in Ethiopia.

In this article, I�ll be looking back at some of the records and some of the highlights � or low-lights � of the Big Four�s contributions since 1985 and giving some insight into where it�s all gone wrong for them.