Saara Aalto, who represented Finland at this year’s Eurovision Song Contest, has recently been awarded the accolade of “Singer of the Year”, by Finnish LGBT+ magazine, QX.
The awards gala took place in Helsinki on Saturday
On 12th August, Saara announced on her Instagram account that she had been nominated for QX’s “Singer of the Year” award, and on Saturday (25th August), it was announced during the QX Gala in Helsinki that Saara was voted the winner of the award, by her fans and readers of the magazine.
Other award winners at the gala included Helsinki’s city councillor, Siliva Modig, who won “Politician of the Year”, drag queen, Linnea von Kattendam, who won “Drag of the Year” and Jani Toivola, who won “Book of the Year” for her autobiography, “Musta tulee isona valkoinen”.
Saara was unable to collect her award in person, due to performing at Pride Cymru in Cardiff on Sunday, however she did take to Instagram to thank her fans for voting for her.
Her 23-date European tour will begin on 2nd October
Despite a busy summer performing at four Pride events – Europride in Stockholm, London Pride, Helsinki Pride and Pride Cymru in Cardiff – Saara will not be taking a break from performing this winter! Instead, she will embark on a 23-date European tour in October.
Her tour will begin in Glasgow’s Poetry Club on 2nd October and will conclude on 10th November in Hameelinna, Finland. During her tour, she will be performing concerts in Spain, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark and the UK, as well as her home country, Finland.
You can still purchase tickets to see Saara perform across Europe on her website.
Life after Eurovision for Saara Aalto
She became Finland’s first qualifier since 2014 in Lisbon, scoring 25th place in the final, but what has Saara been up since Eurovision in May?
As mentioned earlier in the post, Saara has performed at several Pride events throughout the summer in Sweden, Finland and the UK, however she also supported British dance-pop group, Steps, on their ‘Summer of Steps’ tour which began in May. She supported Steps at eight of their dates, performing at venues across the UK, including London’s Kew Gardens, Chester’s Bolesworth Castle and Canterbury’s Spitfire Ground. Former Eurovision participants, Blue, who represented the UK in 2011, also supported Steps on their tour.
Saara has also been promoting her seventh studio album, Wild Wild Wonderland, which reached number 2 in the Finnish Albums Chart. The album featured her Eurovision entry, “Monsters”, along with her two other UMK entries, “Queens” and “Domino”, plus new songs including her new single, “DANCE!!!”.
If you’d like to remind yourself of Saara’s Eurovision entry, “Monsters”, you can watch her live performance in this year’s grand final in Lisbon below:
Do you think Saara deserved to win “Artist of the Year”? Will you be watching Saara on her European tour?
Let us know in the comments below and on social media @ESCXTRA.
