Thursday 11 June 2020

MARIJA NAUMOVA SINGS 'I WANNA', LATVIA FIRST WIN

Marie N won Eurovision in 2002
Today, The Grandma has been talking with The Watsons about Marie N, the Latvian singer who won the Eurovision Song Contest representing her country in 2002 singing I Wanna.

Latvia has participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 20 times since making its debut at the contest in 2000, where the group Brainstorm finished third with the song My Star.


Before talking about Marie N, The Grandma has offered a new Cambridge Key English Test A2 Example to The Watsons.

  

Marija Naumova (born 23 June 1973 in Latvia) is a Latvian singer.

Under the stage name Marie N, she sings a broad range of music ranging from pop to musical theatre and jazz, and has recorded several albums, with songs in Latvian, French, English, Russian and Portuguese.

Naumova was discovered by famous Latvian musician Raimonds Pauls in 1994 and after a year she performed on TV in searches for talent. She never won, but was noticed by the audience.

In 2002, she won the Eurovision Song Contest for Latvia with her song I Wanna.

In 1998, she performed in a concert celebrating the 100 years jubilee of George Gershwin. In March 1998 she performed on stage in concerts with famous Latvian musicians, and one of those concerts was recorded on CD. That gave her career a boost and she began to participate in several music events, television and radio shows, and give interviews for Latvian newspapers.

Naumova's first solo album, which was completely in Russian, was released in 1999. In 2000 Latvia participated in the Eurovision Song Contest for the first time. Naumova was in the national finals but came second behind Brainstorm. 

In 2001, she again participated in the Latvian preselection, singing Hey Boy Follow Me, which was voted public favourite but was not chosen by the expert jury. Naumova had to wait another year before she was finally chosen to represent Latvia with I Wanna, for which she also wrote the music and co-wrote the lyrics.

More information: All Music

In the Eurovision Song Contest 2002, her performance of I Wanna won the competition and gave Latvia its first ever Eurovision win.

According to author and historian John Kennedy O'Connor in his book The Eurovision Song Contest-The Official History, despite its success at the contest, I Wanna gained the dubious distinction of being the first Eurovision winner that was not released outside of its own territory. Even in Latvia the single never reached the top 30.

In November of her victory year she recorded two new solo albums: one in English, and one in Latvian. She presented the albums to the audience with a tour throughout Latvia.

Marie N won Eurovision in 2002
Naumova co-hosted the Eurovision Song Contest 2003 along with Renars Kaupers of the Latvian band Brainstorm, who came 3rd in the contest in 2000.

In 2004, Marie N successfully combined her singing and acting talents in the lead role of The Sound of Music.

In December Marie N's latest album On My Own was released, with songs in Latvian, French, English and Portuguese. New compositions for Marie N are composed by Sergey Manoukyan, Ivar Must and Andrejs Jevsjukovs. Marie N has written several songs herself, as well. There are cover versions of several world-famous songs in the album -for example, two compositions which were originally written in French, but became very popular in English language.

Marija Naumova has a law degree from the University of Latvia. In 2005, she was chosen as the UNICEF goodwill envoy to Latvia.

As of 2012 she is on a musical hiatus to concentrate on her personal life. She is living in France with her family but still travels back and forth to Latvia.

I Wanna, also known in its original version as I Wonna, was the winning song in the Eurovision Song Contest 2002 performed in English by Marie N representing Latvia. With this victory, Latvia became the second Baltic state to win the Contest, Estonia had achieved the feat one year earlier.

The song was performed twenty-third on the night, following Slovenia's Sestre with Samo ljubezen and preceding Lithuania's Aivaras with Happy You. At the close of voting, it had received 176 points, placing 1st in a field of 24. The song, however, was a commercial failure both in Latvia and Europe.

Marie, along with Brainstorm lead singer Renārs Kaupers, would go on to host the Eurovision Song Contest 2003.

The song is particularly famous for Marie's performance. She began wearing a white suit and a trilby hat, which was removed by one of her dancers. As the song continued, other dancers removed her suit jacket and her dark shirt, revealing the top of a red dress. The suit trousers were then removed, revealing the bottom half of the short dress.

On the final beat of the song, the hem was pulled, revealing the dress to be much longer. This visual performance was also supported by a Salsa-style song, which made full use of the more up-beat tempos increasingly finding success in the Contest.

More information: Wiwi Blogs


Today you think you are the winner
Today you think you are the king
You make me sweat in my emotions
Under your fly-away, fly-away wing.

 
Marie N

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