Two years ago in Tel Aviv, Germany had every reason to be ashamed. And not because S! Sters scored zero points with “Sister” in the final of the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) in the televoting and ended up in penultimate place with a total of 25 points. Unfortunately, that can happen. What was rather embarrassing for the Germans was that the two singers, who were at least partly responsible for the result, withdrew to the pout because they felt they had been treated unfairly. It was just the others to blame. At this year's final in Rotterdam, on the other hand, Germany could be proud of its artist. Jendrik got even fewer points, three from the juries and also zero from the spectators, and also came in 25th, penultimate place,but the twenty-six-year-old took it with composure; he faced his defeat, showed character and even comforted other participants.

What is the matter with the German artists?

In the past ten years they ended up in the back seven times.

Italy, on the other hand, which won the final on Saturday evening, reached seven top ten places during the period.

How can that be?

What do they do differently, better?

First of all: there is no magic formula.

It's not the money either, otherwise Russia could win every year, and San Marino would not only have reached 22nd place with Senhit this year.

The small country had specially flown in the American rapper Flo Rida so that he could be on stage with the pop rap number “Adrenalina”.

One cannot imagine what this pointless act cost.

Germany had tried that before, in 2009 with Dita von Teese.

Result: 20th place.

What works better in other countries

However, there are quite a few things that could be done better. And also what is going better in other countries. Take Italy or the often strong Scandinavian countries. There are elaborate selection processes there, the Sanremo Festival in the south or the Melodifestivalen in Sweden, in which the artists first have to prove themselves. This has a long tradition in both countries and every self-respecting singer or musician wants to win there one day. The supposedly best of the best compete at the ESC, Sweden also has to fight their way through the semifinals at the ESC, Germany and Italy are seeded in the final. But that also means less rehearsal time on the big stage.

Quality prevails.

That doesn't mean that the German participants can't sing.

But that alone is not enough.

There has to be a spark.

And that can work in very different ways.

In any case, it's no longer because of the language.

It used to be thought that one had to sing in English so that as many people as possible could understand what it was about.

Total nonsense.

Hardly anyone this year understood what four of the top five posts were about because they were in Italian (Måneskin with “Zitti e buoni”), French (Barbara Pravi with “Voilà and Gion's Tears with“ Tout l'Univers ”) and even Ukrainian (Go_A with “Schum”) were sung.

The fact that the artist has a message is almost always lost, unless it is a man who appears as a woman with a full beard.

So totally obvious.  

A year with several favorites

The dead grandmother of the Spaniard Blas Cantó, the Bulgarian woman's father with ALS, which is why Victoria had a picture of him on stage in Rotterdam, played no role at all in the decision-making process because almost no one knew the stories. You have to internalize your message a lot more. Only then does it come across, like with Conchita Wurst, who, when she was on stage in Copenhagen in 2014 with “Rise Like A Phoenix”, obviously sang about her own fate. Duncan Laurence, Netta, Salvador Sobral, Jamala, Conchita - most of the winners in recent years had a song that was important to them, that they burned for, that they performed with a courage and a willingness to suffer that the world around them was forgotten. The viewer felt this, even without understanding,that Jamala's “1944” dealt with such a highly complex topic as the expulsion of the Crimean Tatars in 1944.