Anthem - Intellect

Signifying Europe
In Irish Millstreet the same year that the EU was established, Enrico Ruggeri—
perhaps in an effort to follow up on Italy’s success three years earlier—only managed
to place ‘Sole D’Europa’ at the twelfth position in the final. Ruggeri, dressed in black
and white, stood alone with the microphone, singing his own emotional and rather
melancholic ballad, accompanied first acoustically and in the end by rock drums and
an electric guitar that gets a brief concluding solo. The Italian lyrics present a poetic
reflection on the effects of war, with rather complex metaphors and a stretched-out
narrative instead of concise political hooks. ‘Sole D’Europa’ means ‘Sun of Europe’,
and the song is like a prayer to the sun to return to a war-stricken and forgotten
Europe. A sad picture is given of a rather hopeless situation where ‘the days never
change’ but also ‘the dreams never change’, and the chorus lines beg the sun to finally
return: ‘Wake up, sun, so we can feel you / Today nobody asks for you / Cover Europe
with light, do you remember where it is? / Come with me, fly with me, warm me up
again.’ An undefined ‘they’ is said to ‘change their uniform and colour / but their tired
souls wait for the sun’, and the final chorus repeats its prayer, but this time collectively:
‘Wake us up, sun, make us understand […] Rise for us, come up with us, warm us up
again.’ 436 There are many echoes here of the Schuman Declaration and even of Schiller
and Beethoven, but the hope for a redeeming sun as a dues-ex-machina has a religious
feel that differs from the dominant political tradition where Europe’s awakening is
instead supposed to derive from its own determination.
A kind of religious awakening spirit returned to Tallin, Estonia in 2002 when Rosa
from Spain performed ‘Europe’s Living a Celebration’, getting an honourable seventh
position in the ESC competition. The song had lyrics by Xasqui Ten and music by
Toni Ten, and sounded like disco with gospel influences, underlined by Rosa’s steady
voice and energetic performance in sweeping black dress, and with five backing
vocalists. The song leaves a strong impression, with syncopated call-and-response
polyphony that creates a sense of an ecstatic congregation. The title words in English
are often repeated, but all other words are in Spanish and contain no specific reference
to Europe; instead they celebrate an abstract feeling of togetherness. The ‘I’ feels a
thrill as a new dream (or illusion; the Spanish term can have both meanings) is born
inside her, opening a way from ‘me’ to ‘you’: ‘All together, let us sing / Europe living
a celebration / Our dream—our reality’. The song is about trusting passion and love
in the heart, singing together and never saying goodbye again. This may of course
signify again the unified European peoples, but is abstract enough to also cover more
personal love unions, in the tradition of gospel and soul music where the line between
spiritual and profane love was always thin.
So far, there seems to be two main topics involved in the ESC songs of Europe. One
theme that rings in all the songs is a kind of touristic celebration of Europe’s cultural
density and historical heritage, with urban culture in the traditional western part of the
continent in focus. A second topic that is most prominent since 1990 is a celebratory
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