Basilea, Switzerland – The Austrians were preparing on Sunday to welcome home and celebrate the classic training singer JJ, who won the 69th Eurovision song contest For your country with “Wasted Love”, a song that combines operatic and multi-octavas voices with a techno turn.
It was expected that the 24 -year -old contractor, who sings in the Vienna state opera, would land at Vienna airport in the afternoon and held a press conference at night.
JJ, whose full name is Johannes Pietsch, which the third winner of Austria’s Eurovision, after the Barbuda Drag Queen, Conchita Wursst, in 2014 and Uudo Jürgens in 1966.
“This is beyond my wildest dreams. It’s crazy,” said the singer when he received the Eurovision glass trophy in the form of a microphone after his victory in the Swiss city of Basel on Saturday night.
Austria leaders were one of the first to congratulate JJ. On Sunday morning, the president of the country, Alexander Van Der Bellen, celebrated JJ in a video posted in X.
“What success! What voice! What a show!” exclaimed. “All Austria is happy.”
Foreign Minister Christian Stoecker wrote in X: “What a great success, my warmest congratulations for winning #ESC2025! JJ is writing history of Austrian music today!”
The Opera of the state of Vienna also expressed joy for victory. “From the magical flute to winning the song contest is somehow a story that can only take place in Austria,” said Opera Director Bogdan Rosco to the Austrian Press Agency APA.
Several Austrian cities quickly showed their interest in organizing next year’s contest. The mayor of Innsbruck, Johannes Anzengruber, told Apa that “not everything has to take place in Vienna … Austria is bigger than that”, and the cities of Oberwart in Burgenland and Wels in high Austria also threw their hats into the ring.
JJ himself said Saturday night that he expected Vienna to get the next ESC that he would love to organize along with his mentor, Conchita Wurst.
Israeli singer Yuval Raphael It was second in an exuberant celebration of music and unity that was shaded by the Gaza War and shaken by discord about Israel’s participation.
JJ won after a final to bite his nails that saw Raphael get a mass public vote of his many fans for his anthem “The new day will rise.” But also faced protests from pro-palestinian protesters who asked Israel to be expelled from the contest about their behavior of the War against Hamas in Gaza.
At a press conference after victory, JJ said that the message of his song about unrequited romance was that “love is the strongest force on planet Earth, and love persevered.
“We highlight love, boys,” said JJ, who added that he felt honored to be the first Eurovision champion with the Filipino heritage, as well as a proudly strange winner.
The largest live music event in the world, which has been joining and dividing Europeans since 1956, came to their conclusion with a great final in a great final in Basel That offered electropop blows, peculiar rock and scandalous divas.
Facts from 26 countries: cut from 37 participants to Two elimination semifinals – Made to some 160 million viewers For the pop crown of the continent. No smoke machine, Jet of Flame or vertiginous light exhibition was saved by musicians who had three minutes to win millions of spectators who, together with national jurors of music professionals, chose the winner.
Estonia’s Tommy cash The third came with his Mock-Iallian Jukey dance song “Espresso Macchiato”. Swedish entrance KajThat he had been a favorite to win with the Jaunty Sauna Ode “Bara Bada Bastu”, came fourth.
Several very praised singers who had been proposed to win fell short, including the French Chanteuse Louane and the moving Dutch singer Claude.
The show was a celebration of eclectic musical tastes and sometimes baffled in Europe.
This year’s contest was started for the second year by disputes on Israel’s participation. Raphael, a survivor of Hamas’ on October 7, 2023, the attack against a music festival in southern Israel that triggered Gaza’s War, found a mixture of cheers and boos while sanging.
The Swiss station SRG SSR said that a man and a woman were arrested while trying to climb on a stage barrier at the end of their song. He said a crew member was beaten by paint released by the couple. Raphael’s team said they left it “shocked and upset.”
The cross -border attacks on October 7 by Hamas militants killed 1,200 people, and approximately 250 were taken to Gaza. According to the Ministry of Health of the Territory, more than 52,800 people in Gaza have been killed in the Israel reprisal offensive.
Pro-Palestinian and Pro-Israel protests took place in Basel, although on a much smaller scale than last year’s event in Sweden.
Hundreds of people marched through Basel just before the competition, stirring Palestinian flags and singing “Bicots Israel”. Basel Police said Sunday that the protest had not been authorized and that three officers and a protester were injured.
Earlier on Saturday, a group of supporters in Israel had gathered in the Plaza Cathedral of Basel to support Raphael and show that “the Jews belong to public spaces in Switzerland,” said Rebecca Laes-Kushner, resident of Zurich, Laes-Kushner.
She said that “it is supposed to be music, not about hate.”
The European broadcasting union, or EBU, which is directed by Eurovision, tightened the Code of Conduct of the contest this year, asking the participants to respect the Eurovision values of “universality, diversity, equality and inclusiveness” and its political neutrality.
Eurovision director Martin Green told journalists that the objective of the organizers was “to restore a sense of unity, calm and union this year in a difficult world.” He said that the 37 national delegations “have behaved impeccably.”
Grieshaber reported from Berlin.
