Mary Spiteri (born 25 October 1947) is a Maltese singer and television personality from

Naxxar Naxxar ( mt, In-Naxxar) is a small city in the Northern Region of Malta, with a population of 14,891 people as of March 2014. The Naxxar Church is dedicated to Our Lady of Victories. The annual village feast is celebrated on 8 September. Naxx ...

. She has participated in various national and international music festivals, one of which she came third when representing Malta in the Eurovision Song Contest. She is known for her support for the Labour Party in her home country.

Eurovision and later

Spiteri represented

Malta Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...

in the 1992 Eurovision Song Contest held in

Malmö Malmö (, ; da, Malmø ) is the largest city in the Swedish county (län) of Scania (Skåne). It is the third-largest city in Sweden, after Stockholm and Gothenburg, and the sixth-largest city in the Nordic region, with a municipal pop ...

, Sweden, with the song " Little Child". Spiteri finished in third place behind Ireland and the United Kingdom. But 1992 was not Spiteri's first attempt at Eurovision. In 1971, she participated in the Maltese heat of Eurovision with the song "Min Int?" (Who Are You?). Another attempt was made in 1975 when Spiteri performed two songs in the Maltese final, "Live For Tomorrow" and "Try a Little Love Today". After her 1992 appearance, Spiteri became something of a diva figure to Eurovision fans and was presented with an award by

Eurovision Network Eurovision is a pan-European television telecommunications network owned and operated by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). It was founded 1954 in Geneva, Switzerland, and its first official transmission took place on 6 June 1954. Major tel ...

at their convention held in Coventry that year. Spiteri's subsequent efforts to return to the Eurovision stage have not been successful. She was unplaced in the 1995 Maltese final with "Just One Love" but managed third place in 1997 with "Lovers Play with Words". In September 2006, Spiteri announced that she hoped to participate in the

Malta Song for Europe Malta has participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 34 times since its debut in . The contest is broadcast in Malta on the PBS channel, TVM. Malta has yet to win the contest, but is the only non-winning country to have achieved four top th ...

Festival in 2007, and submitted a number of songs, none of which were selected for the Maltese Song for Europe Festival. Spiteri tried again and she has successfully entered two songs which competed in Malta Song For Europe in 2008, but was unsuccessful in reaching the Eurovision. In 2014, it was announced that Spiteri held the longest note for 13 seconds in Eurovision Song Contest history with her performance of Little Child in 1992.

References

1947 births Living people Eurovision Song Contest entrants of 1992 Eurovision Song Contest entrants for Malta 20th-century Maltese women singers 20th-century Maltese singers 21st-century Maltese women singers 21st-century Maltese singers {{Malta-bio-stub