This is a presentation of all the points and rankings from the 2024 Eurovision Grand Final from Malmö.
Thank you again to Danielle Kelly for her code in R which did an efficient pull of all the data from the eurovision.tv website.
The backing music is lifted from the actual broadcasts, via @KubasEurovision - the music was composed by Eirik Røland, Johan Nilsson, SVT, EBU (all rights to them). I also used the 2022 Turin voting music: All rights belong to: Maurizio Filardo, Rai, EBU.
EBU Executive Supervisor Martin Österdahl may well have been relieved that HMS Eurovision was docking into his native Sweden (Österdahl was Executive Producer for 2013 and 2016) after the tumult of the shared production in Liverpool, RAI’s approach to show-running and the COVID years. Unfortunately stormy waters were ahead for Eurovision…where did we leave that boat they had at the back of the stage in 1992?
The surety of a polished production from the House of Melodifestivalen was the anchor around which this edition successfully got to air on time, and without a devastating incident.
For some historical context, we could look to Stockholm 1975. Back then, Israel’s singer Shalom Artzi had a threat to his life just before he went on stage. There was heightened security around the show, with the Israeli delegation separated from the rest. The left-wing ‘Red Army Faction’ was planning an attack in Sweden, but it came at the West German Embassy some months after the Contest. Furthermore, a boycott was being organised too…this time for conductors to opt out of Eurovision in protest at the commercialisation of music. Two conductors out of 70 asked stayed away.
In 2024, Israel’s inclusion was very much the driver of a boycott - although it’s still unclear how effective it was. Artists from numerous nations did sign a public letter protesting Israel’s actions in Gaza (which are following the terrorist attack against Israel in October 2023) but ultimately 37 delegations turned up.
Israel’s inclusion seemed to create a sour atmosphere between delegations backstage. There are numerous claims of misconduct by the Israeli delegation that are due to be raised by Serbia and Slovenia. Ireland, Switzerland and Greece were all absent from one flag parade rehearsal due to a meeting being held with the EBU.
One incident still under investigation and with reportedly no link to the Israeli delegation involved the Dutch artist Joost Klein. Klein was barred from rehearsing in the Grand Final dress rehearsals on Friday, but it wasn’t until the morning of the Grand Final that he was removed from the running order…or not as the case maybe (song 5 remained but with no performance). New ground in Eurovision history was broken here, although late non-participations aren’t unprecedented - see France 1974, but that became evident some 4 days prior to the final and was for very different reasons.
The ‘incidents’ section of Wiki’s page on this year is also littered with Eurovision perennials - political statements made with clothing, and gestures, oh and the flag policy. Whilst booing came about as part of Russia’s actions in 2014, stifling the booing in the production was denied by SVT and the EBU, despite it being used in Vienna 2015.
Unfortunately the frothy waters surrounding Eurovision ended up washing into the cold hard rocks of data. A few questions spring to mind: the denied ‘Europapa’ did well in its semi-final, where would the audience points gone? ‘Europapa’ received a valid jury result for the Grand Final but only accrued 58 points (which were redistributed)…was that depressed as the juries knew something was up? We know some jurors deliberately ranked Israel’s ‘Hurricane’ lower (see Norway), we know that Israel may have been on a drive to get televotes on the board too - and did the furore puncturing the mainstream media result in a lopsided public vote for them?
The juries eventually steered the ship to safe waters. A landslide, more impressive than Loreen’s in Liverpool, meant Switzerland and Nemo’s ‘The Code’ only needed a fifth place televote score to win by 44 points. The second place being the popular favourite from Croatia (although the public vote was more evenly split this year compared to that for ‘Cha Cha Cha’).
Pleased with 2024 should be Ireland and Germany, who both ended up with their best result in years. Ukraine and Sweden should be pleased that new voting rules meant awful running order positions didn’t dent their excellent entries as much as some might have thought. Portugal and Armenia making the top 10 was little predicted, I feel. Perhaps the least happy with Malmö be the UK, Norway, Australia and Denmark. Two that were perhaps Grand Final worthy, and two Grand Finalists that just didn’t connect with voters, both jury and public.
To Switzerland we go, back home, for the first time since 1989. A land-locked country… which will be a relief to many.
00:00 Intro and notes
01:00 Jury votes
10:56 Audience votes