The night after the 2024 Eurovision Grand Final, Lithuanian representative Silvester Belt published a tweet to express his trauma after his performance. Having since returned to Lithuania, he gave more reassuring details about his overall experience during the Eurovision weeks.
The Eurovision night tweet
Less than two hours after the end of the Grand Final, Silvester took to Twitter to describe his feelings during and right after the big night. He called it a “traumatic experience“, “one of the worst things [he] had to go through“, because of the intensity of the atmosphere in the arena after the previous performance.
While he does not name the country in question, it was Israel, which was sixth in the running order of the night, Lithuania being seventh. As it has been confirmed many times by people in the arena, including members of the ESCXtra team, the atmosphere in the arena before, during, and right after that performance was indeed tense and extremely loud. A number of people were booing, others were being very supportive, and this mix created the loudest and most divisive reaction.
Silvester Belt only had a minute to get on stage and get in the right mindset to perform “Luktelk”, having just experience this from backstage.
His comments back home
Silvester finished in 14th place in the Grand Final, with 90 points (58 from the public, 32 from the juries),
On Sunday, 12th of May, Silvester Belt flew back to Lithuania (although he almost missed his flag) and was welcomed by fans in Vilnius. In a press conference, he acknowledged the uneasiness he may have felt during the competition, explaning that he tried to focus on his performance, to make his country proud.
There was a strange atmosphere, all kinds of interesting things happening at Eurovision this year, but we tried to distance ourselves from it. We knew that a lot of people in Lithuania had expectations and were rooting for us, so we wanted to honour that, to pull ourselves together and to do our best.
Silvester Belt, quoted by LRT
He also thanked his team for the support he had during the competition, without which he would have “fallen apart”.
He revealed that he had no intention to take part in the contest again, at least in the coming years. Despite that, he keeps fond memories of other parts of his experience: the feeling of being part of a family with his team, the strong support that helped him throughout, and the new connections he made. He concluded by expressing his hope that these connections will endure beyond the competition, unlike those built in summer camps, often forgotten after a week.
I will miss the sense of family every day. We were just talking with my stylist about how tomorrow I’ll have to get up and there will be no outfit to wear
Silvester Belt, quoted by LRT
How do you feel about Silvester’s experience? Are you proud of his result? What do you expect from him in the coming months/years of his musical career? Tell us more in the comments below or on social media at @escxtra!
