Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

won the

Eurovision Song Contest 2010 The Eurovision Song Contest 2010 was the 55th edition of the Eurovision Song Contest. It took place in Oslo, Norway, following the country's victory at the with the song "Fairytale (Alexander Rybak song), Fairytale" by Alexander Rybak. Organise ...

, which was held in May 2010 in

Oslo Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of ...

, Norway. The country's entry was selected in a series of competitive heats and a national final – ''Unser Star für Oslo'' – which was organised jointly by the public broadcasters ARD and NDR and the private television channel

ProSieben ProSieben (, ''sieben'' is German for "seven"; often stylized as Pro7) is a German free-to-air television network owned by ProSiebenSat.1 Media. It was launched on 1 January 1989. It is Germany's second-largest privately owned television company ...

, together with the three-time Eurovision participant for Germany (as singer and/or songwriter) and music producer, Stefan Raab.

Before Eurovision

Preparations

On 25 May 2009, ARD and NDR was revealed to have approached Stefan Raab and private broadcaster

to collaborate in preparing for the 2010 Eurovision Song Contest with a view of creating a possible winning combination of artist and song. It was revealed that Raab had refused the request, but that ProSieben had accepted the offer. More information was revealed on 20 July 2009, with the news that Raab would in fact work with the two broadcasters in preparing for the 2010 contest.

''Unser Star für Oslo''

''Unser Star für Oslo 2010'' (English: Our Star for Oslo) was the competition that selected Germany's entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 2010. The competition consisted of eight shows between 2 February and 12 March 2010 all taking place at the Köln-Mülheim Studios in

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western States of Germany, state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 m ...

, hosted by

Matthias Opdenhövel Matthias Augustinus Wilhelm Georg Opdenhövel (born 25 August 1970) is a German television presenter. Biography Born in Detmold, Opdenhövel has worked as journalist and television presenter for German broadcasters ARD, Sat 1, Pro7, VIVA G ...

and

Sabine Heinrich Sabine Heinrich (born 27 December 1976 in Unna, North Rhine-Westphalia, West Germany) is a German radio and television presenter. Career Heinrich worked at the radio station 1LIVE in Cologne from 2001 until June 2016. At 1LIVE she presented ...

. The national final was co-produced by Stefan Raab's production company Brainpool. Twenty contestants competed during the shows with the winner being selected through a public televote. The first five shows were broadcast on ProSieben, the quarter-final was broadcast on

Das Erste Das Erste (; "The First") is the flagship national television channel of the ARD association of public broadcasting corporations in Germany. ''Das Erste'' is jointly operated by the nine regional public broadcasting corporations that are member ...

as well as online via NDR's official website ''ndr.de'', the semi-final was broadcast on ProSieben and the final was broadcast on Das Erste and online via ''ndr.de''. The final of the competition was watched by 4.5 million viewers in Germany.

Format

Interested artists were able to apply for the competition by submitting an online application. After submitting an application, artists could present themselves and perform at casting shows that were held in Cologne between 18 September 2009 and 6 November 2009. By the end of the process, it was announced that over 4,500 candidates had applied for the competition. The twenty contestants, most being inexperienced and young singers, were selected by an expert panel consisting of Raab and representatives of ARD. The competition consisted of eight shows. In each of the first two shows on 2 and 9 February 2010, ten contestants performed a cover of a song of their choice and five advanced in the competition. In the third and fourth show on 16 and 23 February 2010, the remaining contestants performed and two were eliminated per show. In the fifth show on 2 March 2010, one contestant was eliminated, and the top five proceeded to the quarter-final on 5 March 2010. In the quarter-final, the five remaining contestants performed covers of two songs of their choice, and four advanced to the semi-final on 9 March 2010. In the semi-final, the four remaining contestants performed covers of two songs of their choice, and the top two proceeded to the final on 12 March 2010. The final consisted of two rounds. In the first round, the two finalists performed three songs especially written for Eurovision, and one song for each finalist proceeded to the second round. In the second round, the winner was decided from the two combinations of song and artist. During each show, Stefan Raab and two guest judges of varying members provided feedback in regards to the contestants. Public voting included options for landline and SMS voting. Each show featured a different pair of guest judges: * Heat 1:

Yvonne Catterfeld Yvonne Catterfeld (born 2 December 1979) is a German singer, actress, and television personality. Born and raised in Erfurt, Thuringia, she later moved to Leipzig to pursue her career in music. In 2000, she participated in the debut season of the ...

and

Marius Müller-Westernhagen Marius Müller-Westernhagen (born 6 December 1948) is a German musician and actor. He has been a feature in German rock music since the mid-1970s. Müller-Westernhagen is known for his energetic public concerts, and his fans know his anthem-like ...

* Heat 2: Sarah Connor and

Peter Maffay Peter Alexander Makkay (born 30 August 1949), known as Peter Maffay (), is a Romanian-born German musician, singer, and composer. Early life Born in Braşov (german: link=no, Kronstadt), Romania, the son of a German (Transylvanian Saxon), h ...

* Heat 3:

Nena Gabriele Susanne Kerner (born 24 March 1960), better known as Nena, is a German singer and songwriter who rose to international fame in 1983 as the lead vocalist of the band Nena with the Neue Deutsche Welle song "99 Luftballons". In the same ye ...

and König Boris * Heat 4: Sasha and

Cassandra Steen Cassandra Steen (born 9 February 1980) is a German-American singer who rose to fame as the lead singer of the pop/soul trio Glashaus. After a series of commercially successful releases with the group, she released her moderately successful solo ...

* Heat 5:

Joy Denalane Joy Maureen Denalane (born 11 June 1973) is a German singer-songwriter, known for her mixture of soul, R&B, and African folk music with lyrics in German and English. Early life Denalane was born in Berlin-Schöneberg to a South African father ...

and

Rea Garvey Raymond Michael Garvey (born 3 May 1973) is an Irish singer, songwriter and guitarist now residing in Germany. In 1998, he formed the band Reamonn. Over the 11 years that Garvey was their frontman, they saw chart-topping success in Europe, wit ...

* Quarter-final:

Anke Engelke Anke Christina Fischer ( Engelke; born 21 December 1965) is a German comedian, actress, voice actress and television presenter. Personal life Born in Montreal, Canada, Engelke moved to Cologne, Germany in 1971 with her German parents. Early ...

and

Adel Tawil Adel Salah Mahmoud Eid El-Tawil (born 15 August 1978) is a German singer, songwriter and producer. Besides his solo career, he is part of the popular German duo Ich + Ich and a former member of the boy band The Boyz. Early life Tawil was born ...

* Semi-final:

Barbara Schöneberger Barbara von Schierstädt (; born 5 March 1974) is a German television presenter, actress and singer. Early life Schöneberger is the only child of clarinet player Hans Schöneberger and his wife Annemarie. She studied sociology, art history and ...

and

Jan Delay Jan Phillip Eißfeldt (born 25 August 1976), known professionally as Jan Delay, is a German rapper and singer whose stylistic range includes mainly hip hop, reggae, dub and funk. An accomplished solo artist, he became known to the public as a ...

* Final:

Stefanie Kloß Silbermond ("silver moon") is a German pop rock band from Bautzen, Saxony. The band consists of Stefanie Kloß, Andreas Nowak, and brothers Johannes and Thomas Stolle. History The band members originally met in 1998 when they participated in t ...

and

Xavier Naidoo Xavier Kurt Naidoo (German: �kseːviɐ naɪˈduː born 2 October 1971) is a German soul and R&B singer, songwriter and record producer. He is a founding member of German band Söhne Mannheims, and started two record labels, Beats Around the ...

Elimination chart

Shows

= Final

= The televised final took place on 12 March 2010. The winner was selected through two rounds of public voting. In the first round, the two finalists

Jennifer Braun Jennifer Braun (born 28 April 1991) is a German singer. She was runner-up at the talent show '' Unser Star für Oslo'', Germany's national pre-selection show for the Eurovision Song Contest 2010. Her first music single was " I Care for You". B ...

and

Lena Meyer-Landrut Lena Johanna Therese Meyer-Landrut (; born 23 May 1991), also known by the mononym Lena, is a German singer. She rose to fame after representing Germany in the Eurovision Song Contest 2010 in Oslo, winning the contest with her song "Satellite". ...

each performed their versions of " Bee" and "

Satellite A satellite or artificial satellite is an object intentionally placed into orbit in outer space. Except for passive satellites, most satellites have an electricity generation system for equipment on board, such as solar panels or radioisotope ...

" as well as an individual song, and the song for each finalist was determined and proceeded to the second round. The songs were: "

" performed by Lena Meyer-Landrut and " I Care for You" performed by

. In the second round, the winner, "Satellite" performed by Lena Meyer-Landrut, was selected.

Promotion

The six versions of the four finalist songs were released minutes after the final concluded. By 13 March Meyer-Landrut led the German

iTunes iTunes () is a software program that acts as a media player, media library, mobile device management utility, and the client app for the iTunes Store. Developed by Apple Inc., it is used to purchase, play, download, and organize digital mul ...

download charts with all three of her songs: "

" taking the top spot, followed by " Bee" in second and " Love Me" in third place.

's song " I Care for You" took fourth place in the chart, followed by her versions of "Bee" and "Satellite" in 7th and 14th position respectively. A

maxi single A maxi single or maxi-single (sometimes abbreviated to MCD or CDM) is a music single release with more than the usual two tracks of an A-side song and a B-side song. The first maxi singles Mungo Jerry's first single, "In the Summertime" was the ...

featuring Meyer-Landrut's three songs was released on 16 March. "Satellite" entered the

German singles chart The GfK Entertainment charts are the official music charts in Germany and are gathered and published by GfK Entertainment (formerly Media Control and Media Control GfK International), a subsidiary of GfK, on behalf of Bundesverband Musikindust ...

at number one and has been certified platinum since.Maier, Jens
Lena Meyer-Landrut: Satellite wird mit Platin ausgezeichnet
Stern.de. 14 April 2010. Accessed 14 April 2010. On 16 March 2010, the video premiered on public broadcaster

right before Germany's most watched evening news bulletin '' Tagesschau''. Shortly after, it was simultaneously shown on four private stations ( Sat.1,

, kabel eins, N24) before the start of their evening

prime time Prime time or the peak time is the block of broadcast programming taking place during the middle of the evening for a television show. It is mostly targeted towards adults (and sometimes families). It is used by the major television networks to ...

programmes.Mantel, Uwe
Lenas "Satellite" feiert Premiere auf fünf Sendern
DWDL.de. 24 March 2010. Accessed 24 March 2010. As of July 2021, 5he two officially uploaded

YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...

videos of the song have jointly generated more than 109 million views since their release.

At Eurovision

Lena Meyer-Landrut at PC after 2010 Eurovision 2

As a member of the " Big Four", Germany automatically qualified for the final on 29 May. Lena Meyer-Landrut performed 22nd out of the 25 participating countries and won the contest with 246 points. It is the first time that Germany has won the contest since

1982 Events January * January 1 – In Malaysia and Singapore, clocks are adjusted to the same time zone, UTC+8 (GMT+8.00). * January 13 – Air Florida Flight 90 crashes shortly after takeoff into the 14th Street bridges, 14th Street Bridge in ...

and the first time as a unified state. As such, Germany hosted the

Eurovision Song Contest 2011 The Eurovision Song Contest 2011 was the 56th edition of the Eurovision Song Contest. It took place in Düsseldorf, Germany, following the country's victory at the with the song "Satellite" by Lena. Organised by the European Broadcasting Union ...

Voting

Points awarded to Germany

Points awarded by Germany

References

External links

Unser Star für Oslo official website
{{Lena Meyer-Landrut

2010 File:2010 Events Collage New.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2010 Chile earthquake was one of the strongest recorded in history; The Eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland disrupts air travel in Europe; A scene from the opening ceremony of ...

Countries in the Eurovision Song Contest 2010

Eurovision The Eurovision Song Contest (), sometimes abbreviated to ESC and often known simply as Eurovision, is an international songwriting competition organised annually by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), featuring participants representing pr ...