Read all of the OnEurope coverage from Eurovision 2016
From Wikipedia
The Eurovision Song Contest 2016 was the 61st edition of the Eurovision Song Contest. It took place in the Ericsson Globe in Stockholm, Sweden, following Sweden’s victory at the 2015 contest in Vienna with the song “Heroes”, performed by Måns Zelmerlöw. This was the third time the contest had taken place in Stockholm, after 1975 and 2000, the latter also being held at the Globe. The contest consisted of two semi-finals on 10 and 12 May and the final on 14 May 2016, with all three live shows hosted by Zelmerlöw and Petra Mede.
The winner of the contest was Ukraine with the song “1944”, performed by Jamala. This was Ukraine’s second win and its first since 2004. This was the first time since the introduction of professional jury voting in 2009 that the overall winner won neither the jury vote, which was won by Australia, nor the televote, which was won by Russia, with Ukraine placing only second in both. It was also the first song with lyrics in Crimean Tatar to win or even enter the contest.
Forty-two countries participated in the contest. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia and Ukraine returned after absences from recent contests, while Australia also returned after debuting as a special guest in 2015. Portugal withdrew, largely due to their national broadcaster’s insufficient promotion of their music-based media, while Romania had originally planned to participate, but was forced to withdraw due to repeated non-payment of debts by their national broadcaster to the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). The contest was also the first to implement a voting system since 1975: each country’s professional jury points were announced largely as before, while the results of each national televote were combined and announced in reverse order.
Twenty-six countries competed in the final, which was the first to be broadcast on live television in the United States. The Czech Republic managed to qualify for the final for the first time in five attempts since its debut in 2007, while both Bosnia and Herzegovina and Greece failed to qualify from the semi-finals for the first time ever, the latter being absent from the final for the first time since 2000. In the final, Australia finished second, improving on its debut in 2015, while Bulgaria finished fourth, its best result since its debut in 2005. Justin Timberlake performed during the interval act of the final. Over 200 million viewers worldwide watched the contest, setting a new record and beating the 2015 viewing figures by over 3 million.
| Semi final one results | 10 May 2016 |
|---|---|
| Semi final two results | 12 May 2016 |
| Final results | 14 May 2016 |
