Why Eurovision: Because It Brought Us Together Written by Ewan Spence on March 28, 2014 | 5 Comments

Continuing our series where we ask noted Eurovision writers and personalities the question ‘Why Eurovision’, this week we turn to the Song Contest’s Events Supervisor Sietse Bakker. A long and 21st century career path has led him to where he is today, but how did it all start and what does it have to do with Eurovision?

When I was in High School in the Netherlands we had a doubtful tradition that one doesn’t really talk to people from classes with younger students. So I’m fifteen, and on the school’s cultural trip to Rome with another class. We were ‘the young ones’ and they were a year older. It took less than twenty-four hours on the bus from Amsterdam to get people talking. I got chatting with a girl.

By the time we drove back from Rome I had fallen in love with her.

All scrubbed up for the first day at the office (Picture: S Bakker / Flickr)

What would that have to do with my job as Event Supervisor in the Eurovision Song Contest, you may think? Well, I didn’t dare to tell her, but we did become good friends and one day, she invited me to join an annual tradition she had with her mother. Yes indeed; watching the Eurovision Song Contest. Not quite something I was interested in, but I somehow imagined that if her mother would find me a good fit for her daughter, I’d stand a better chance

It was a strange evening, that spring day of 2000; due to a fireworks disaster elsewhere in the country (the Enschede Fireworks Disaster), the broadcaster terminated the live transmission and we saw Denmark winning via Belgian television.

Months later, I decided to build a website for fun. She proposed to do something with the Eurovision Song Contest, and that’s what inspired me to start a website. Esctoday.com was born. It ran completely out of hand and six years later the EBU invited me to take on the challenge of re-igniting the contest’s official website, Eurovision.tv. Two years later, in 2008, ‘Geneva’ asked me to take on all communications work for the Contest, in 2011 I was appointed Event Supervisor as Jon Ola Sand took over from Svante Stockselius.

For most people in Europe, the Eurovision Song Contest is an annual television spectacle, a night of fun TV with family and friends. Some see it as an obscure European tradition which in the famous words of Terry Wogan “people hate to love and love to hate.”

To me, some may think it’s a job. It is a humble honor to be able to contribute to the Contest at this level, but to me it’s much more than a job. It is a reminder of what people can achieve when they come together to build something unique. It’s a reminder of what we have in common in Europe, and what makes us all uniquely different. It’s a catalyst for friendship and creativity for thousands, a source of pleasure for millions.

Stop and think about it – we’re all part of something very special!

An intense presentation (picture: S Bakker)

Fourteen years later, writing this piece, I am reminded of the fact that I’ve dedicated nearly half of my life and my entire professional life to the contest. I’ve gotten to know many great people over the past years.

For me, that journey started when the contest moved from Sweden to Denmark in 2000. And here we are again, back in Denmark, coming from Sweden. Oh…I didn’t tell you what happened with the girl? The contest never really brought us together. She was more into girls!

From “Fly On The Wings Of Love” to “Only Teardrops”? Not really; had she not been sitting next to me on the bus to Rome nearly fifteen years ago, you would most likely never have heard of me.

Let me take this opportunity to invite you to ask any question you may have in the comments. I’ll do my best to answer as many questions as soon as possible – Sietse.