EUROVISION 2017: MUSIC AND LANGUAGE

The finals of the well-known “Eurovision Song Contest” is this Saturday, May 13^th, in Kiev, the capital of Ukraine. I know, it’s not like it’s the Super Bowl and there’s a halftime show with Beyoncé singing, but it’s fun to watch. Just FYI, Spain has won this contest a grand total of… 2 times. I mean, that’s something, right? In the context of a not-so-united European Union, 26 countries will have the chance to show the world what they’re worth (musically speaking, of course) and they’ll make us forget, at least for a while, the wars and destruction in the world (if people are distracted, no one will complain).

It’s not all fun and games, though; there is controversy regarding the language in which the songs are written. This is what the Portuguese song writer had to say about the use of her mother tongue in her song: “The song has to represent us as a country and it just makes sense that it would be written in our beautiful language.” It’s a shame that the Spanish singer didn’t think that way and decided to sing in English. Spanish is the world’s second most spoken native language after Mandarin Chinese, so why would we want to sing in English? Do we have an inferiority complex? Or do we just want to be cooler? Maybe it’s because, apparently, everything sounds better in English. All I’m saying is that the Spanish Royal Academy wouldn’t agree with us singing in English all the time, and I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t dare contradict them… Actually, the song does have some parts in Spanish, but I don’t know if it’s wise to mix two different languages instead of choosing one and sticking with it. Only Belarus, Hungary, Italy and Portugal dared to be different and sing in their mother tongues. Only four countries, isn’t that sad? We should be proud to sing in our own language and to make the audience feel the different emotions that a song can express, even if they don’t fully understand the lyrics.

 

What do you guys think? Do you think that a language is part of the identity of a country and that they should sing in their mother tongues? Comment below!