First Minister Nicola Sturgeon Praises Kinross School’s Eurovision Attempt

Jason Blyth is a teacher at Kinross school in Scotland. Earlier this year, Mr Blyth and his students produced the song ‘Tear Up the Dark’ which was submitted to the British and Romanian Eurovision Song Contest national selections – unfortunately, the song (which was performed by Teodora Dinu) failed to qualify to either but has now received praise from Scotland’s first minister, Nicola Sturgeon and is continuing to make headlines.

‘Tear Up the Dark’ was written by Scottish music teacher Jason Blyth, and was inspired by a friend who was told as a teenager that he would lose his sight. It was submitted to the BBC’s ‘You Decide’ Eurovision selection only to be rejected, however, Blyth later posted a demo of the track onto YouTube and urged artists from other countries who may be interested in using it to get in touch.

Understandably the students were disappointed to learn that the song failed to qualify in the selections but despite that, the song has been played over 40,000 times on YouTube and is continuing to grab the attention of many, including Scotland’s first minister, Nicola Sturgeon.

Speaking in her column of the Daily Record, Sturgeon said: “Well done to them and their teacher Jason Blyth for reaching out across the European Union with a track they wrote and recorded for the Eurovision Song Contest.” In 2009, prior to the Scottish Independence Referendum, Nicola Sturgeon spoke about how she would like to see Scotland themselves competing in the Eurovision Song Contest as an independent nation.

Could Scotland Ever Enter the Eurovision Song Contest Independently?

In 2013, it was confirmed that should Scotland become an independent country they would take part in the Eurovision Song Contest. The 670-page white paper published in November of that year answers a number of questions about Scottish Independence. The future of the Scottish Broadcasting Service was one of the key questions, in the white paper it says that:

The SBS would seek membership of the EBU and would be an active and constructive partner in the organisation. As part of this participation, we would envisage the SBS engaging with some of the EBU competitions, including Scottish entries in the Eurovision Song Contest.

If Scotland were to have voted to leave the United Kingdom, Scotland would have become independent last year and would be able to participate in this year’s Eurovision Song Contest for the first time (subject to the European Broadcasting Union’s acceptance).