The Xtra Eurovision Advent Calendar 2019; part 3

It’s December! Meaning it’s time to dig into the Christmas catalogue of Eurovision artists young and old! Every day from now until Christmas Eve we will bring you a Christmas song performed by Eurovision artists from all corners of the Euroverse, in our advent calendar, so make sure you don’t miss any of them! 13 December So, it's Friday the 13th, and also the day when the Scandinavian countries, and Italy, celebrate Santa Lucia. A Scandinavian man who might have felt a bit like Friday the 13th during the voting sequence of the 2019 Eurovision Song Contest, is John Lundvik. We haven't found a clip of him singing "Santa Lucia", so we have to settle for "Christmas". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5tnsgnEsyM John finished 5th for Sweden at the 2019 Eurovision Song Contest in Tel Aviv, with the song "Too Late for Love". 14 December It's the weekend, so we're turning the tempo up a bit, with "Merry Christmas Everyone". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6dB3GeK9zI Kasey Smith represented Ireland at the 2014 Eurovision Song Contest in Copenhagen. She did so alongside Can-Linn, with the song "Heartbeat". They finished 12th in their semi, thus not qualifying for the grand final. 15 December Today we celebrate the 3rd Sunday of Advent, and in Norway, two of their former participants, along with a few MGP-artists, are doing a Christmas Concert called "Silent Noght, Holy Night". Here is a clip from their 2016 tour; Maria Haukaas Mittet singing the Norwegian song "Lys imot mørketida". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNfdq44JIfM Maria repressented Norway in the 2008 Eurovision Song Contest in Belgrade, finishing 5th with "Hold On, Be Strong". 16 December From yesterday's Nordic with for a light to get through the winter darkness and other troubles, we head south to Albania and Elhaida Dani and her take on an American classic. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hW1SJ0rc7Ds Elhaida Dani represented Albania at the 2015 Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna. There she performed the song "I'm Alive", finishing 10th in her semi, thus just qualifying for the grand final. On the Saturday night she ended 17th. 17 December We promised you a Eurovision winner, and we keep our promises. "Happy Christmas, War is Over" is a proper Christmas classic, and Emmelie de Forest is a peoper Eurovision superstar. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-USSZ8AT2M 18 December No Christmas is complete without some Spanish! Today we give you the massively popular classic "Feliz Navidad". And to make it xtra special; here's Pastora Soler...and Doris Dragovic! Also, we love the waiter at 1.23! #weapprove https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3BKlIc1Txw Pastora represented Spain in Baku in 2012. She performed "Cuédate conmigo", finishing in tenth place, thus giving Spain their first top 10 result since 2004. Doris Dragovic has represented two countries at Eurovision. Her first time on the Eurovision stage was in Bergen in 1986. Representing Yugoslavia, she finished 11th with "Zeljo Moja". Thirteen years later she returned to the contest, this time representing Croatia. Performing "Marija Magdalena", she finished in a very respectable 4th place. This remains the country's best result, shared with Maja Blagdan in 1996. This was the last song in part three of our countdown to Christmas. Make sure to come back tomorrow for part four, where we will give you our final six Christmas picks of 2019. To find tomorrow's artists we have to head pretty far north... Later in the week we'll present you with artists from countries as diverse as The Netherlands, Sweden and Belarus! If you didn’t listen to all the wonderful Christmas songs in part one of the calendar, you can find them here. And part two is here.

17 December

Wivian Renee Kristiansen

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