Azerbaijan had their debut win with "Running Scared" by the duo Ell & Nikki (Eldar Gasimov and Nigar Jamal) in 2011 and this gave them the right to host the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest. Unsurprisingly, the Azerbaijani capital, Baku, was chosen to be the host city and the slogan for the contest was “Light Your Fire”.
The Azerbaijanis constructed the Baku Crystal Hall specially to host the Contest. It was opened on 7 May 2012 just in time for Eurovision to be held on 22-28 May 2012. The hall had capacity for 16,000 Eurovision fans.
Politics is never too remote from the world of Eurovision and it certainly bubbled to the top with Azerbaijan as host. Armenia, human rights, democratic processes, a foiled terrorist attack and forced evictions to build the Crystal Hall where just some of the things surrounding the host country.
Arguably, 2012 was saved by the songs. As everyone knows, Loreen’s Euphoria won the day. Even today Euphoria remains the most iconic Eurovision song from the modern era of the contest. It continues to top the ESC250 annual countdown.
The Contest itself involved 2 semi-finals and a grand final. 42 countries participated, with 18 countries performing in each semi-final and then 26 countries proceeding to the grand final.
Voting was a 50:50 split between the public and juries. Each participating country had a jury consisting of five members.
The Russian grandmothers, Buranovskiye Babushki, finished 1st in semi-final 1 and Sweden’s Loreen finished 1st in semi-final 2. The top 5 in the grand final were:
Sweden
Russia
Serbia
Azerbaijan
Albania
Returning artists for 2012 included Jedward for Ireland, Kaliopi for Macedonia, Jónsi for Iceland and Željko Joksimović for Serbia.
A controversial interval act during the voting period of the grand final saw pop star Emin Agalarov, the President’s son-in-law, perform his song “Never Enough” in a very nationalistic manner.