I mentioned quite some time ago what I wanted to do in the future, and one of those things... was going back further into Eurovision's long history and cover years before my last milestone of reaching 2005. In other words, my goal is to make rankings of 2004 and years prior!

The 2004 contest of Eurovision was the first to take place in Türkiye, in the city of Istanbul. It was also the first year where semifinals were introduced, but not in the format we know today. Instead, the 10 best performing countries in the results (including the winner of course) the year prior got an automatic pass to the final, while the other remaining countries that weren't among those or the big 4 (Italy didn't compete at that time so it was just 4) had to duke it out for one of ten slots remaining for the final. This meant the final consisted of 24 different songs instead of the 25/26 of today as well. The addition of the semifinal also meant that the previously used regulation rule was abolished, meaning all countries didn't need to worry about sitting years out if their previous result wasn't good enough.

The 2004 contest was won by Ukraine, achieving a first victory with Ruslana's 'Wild Dances'. Serbia & Montenegro debuted and finished in 2nd place with Željko Joksimović's 'Lane Moje', while third place was claimed by Greece's Sakis Rouvas with 'Shake It'.

A total of 4 countries debuted this year, those being Albania, Andorra, Belarus and Serbia & Montenegro (which later split into two with them competing separately in 2007).

#eurovision #eurovision2023 #esc2023 #ruslana #wilddances #istanbul #türkiye #ukraine #songfestival

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