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Eugent Bushpepa and Aisel disagree: is Eurovision a contest for all music genres?

Today, Eurovision officially begun as 10 countries had their first rehearsals. They also gave press conferences, and two of the artists in particular seem to have very different views of Eurovision. Azerbaijan’s Aisel describes the contest as a pop contest, whereas Albania’s Eugent Bushpepa says that every genre has a place at Eurovision…who do you agree with?

Aisel’s view

In her press conference, Aisel described Eurovision as a pop contest. It seemed that she believed that the music that takes part in the contest is all pop music, with little room for other genres. The beautiful jazz songstress was asked if singing a pop song may harm her qualification chances, her response was:

I don’t think so because first of all, Eurovision is a pop music contest and a good song is a good song, no matter the music genre. Spreading a positive message should be the main goal, and I don’t think that it harms my chances to qualify.

Eugent Bushpepa’s view
Eugent clearly disagrees strongly with the Azeri representative – he believes that rock music is a “sparkle in the Eurovision Song Contest”:

Generally, I can’t say that it’s a pop festival. It is a festival that has a lot of genres and this year we have some rock songs from Hungary, Switzerland and the Netherlands. We’re not benched yet, and I’d like to be the sparkle that proves that rock music is a sparkle in the Eurovision Song Contest. I don’t want rock music to vanish, I want rock music to stay, like this year – more is better, and it’s suitable for Eurovision.

Both artists comments are likely to cause a stir in the Eurovision community. Many fans love pop music, but others will believe that Eurovision should be more open to other musical genres.
What are your thoughts on this? Do you want Eurovision to be predominantly pop, or would you prefer to see as many genres as possible take part?
Let us know in the comments below and on social media @ESCXTRA!

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