Conchita is the (bearded) lady of the night

In what is perhaps the least surprising Eurovision winning entry of the past few years, Austrian bearded cross-dressing singer Conchita Wurst took home the trophy in last night’s Eurovision Song Festival, held in Copenhagen.

Malta sadly did not fare nearly as well as last year, with our representatives Firelight placing 23rd in the pan-European festival of music and kitsch – a far cry from last year’s 8th place, secured for us by the ever-likeable ‘singing doctor’ Gianluca Bezzina. (Let’s get the cheap joke out of the way early: evocative of their in-competition song, it looks as though Firelight really are ‘Coming Home’…)

Born Thomas Neuwirth in 1988, Conchita Wurst courted both controversy and admiration in the run up to this year’s pan-European pop music competition, with Belarus proving to be the most vociferous protesters to Conchita’s participation in the contest, firing up a petition calling for the Belaurs state broadcaster to edit Wurst’s performance out of its Eurovision broadcast, claiming that the performance would turn Eurovision “into a hotbed of sodomy”.

Perhaps with a defiant nod to the transphobic feelings that heralded her ascension, Conchita received the Eurovision 2014 trophy with a rousing little speech: “This night is dedicated to everyone who believes in the future of peace and freedom. You know who you are. We are a unity, and we are unstoppable,” was Conchita’s closing salvo before she launched into another rendition of her winning ballad ‘Rise Like the Phoenix’.

Second place was taken up by The Netherlands, with musical duo The Common Linnets offering up an unashamedly Nashville-inflected ditty ‘Calm After the Storm’, while Armenia’s Aram MP3 scored third place with the power ballad ‘Not Alone’.

MaltaToday was joined by Daniel Azzopardi of Devil Wears Pra-duh to live-blog last night proceedings. Log on to http://tinyurl.com/kgjbjb2for a recap of how we documented the glitzy madness.