Graham Norton reveals Remember Monday's ‘great advantage' for Eurovision
The trio, made up of friends Lauren Byrne, Holly-Anne Hull and Charlotte Steele who met at school in Hampshire, are the first all-female British group act since Precious in 1999.
They will compete in Saturday's grand final in Basel, Switzerland, against touted favourites such as Sweden's Kaj with their entry Bara Bada Bastu, about Nordic sauna culture, Austria's JJ (Johannes Pietsch) with the emotional song Wasted Love, and Israeli singer Yuval Raphael with the ballad New Day Will Rise.
Irish talk show host and 'king of Eurovision' Norton will return to provide commentary for the BBC.
He said: 'Remember Monday have a great advantage in that they are unlike any other act this year.
'Their vocals and harmonies are flawless, the song has a very strong hook and the trio are hugely likeable. With a decent place in the running order they should do very well indeed.'
On Saturday, Remember Monday will be eighth to compete – meaning they will follow Raphael, Norway's Kyle Alessandro, the youngest Eurovision act this year at 19 years old, Estonia's Tommy Cash with the Italian parody Espresso Macchiato, and Ukraine's Ziferblat.
Norton said that successful acts have good songs that have a 'hook' and 'interesting staging'.
He added: 'It doesn't have to be complicated, just clever and fresh.
'Lastly, and this is the hardest of all, the act needs to be likeable and somehow get their personality across to the audience. Not forgetting great vocals.'
Speaking about the entries this year, he said: 'It's a big year for party anthems and the two that stand out for me are Miriana Conte representing Malta, and Emmy (Kristiansen) for Ireland with an unlikely banger about an immortal dog (unfortunately they didn't make it through to the Grand Final).
'Cutting through all the noise I think Italy might have a good year with a classic rock ballad performed by Lucio Corsi.'
Norwegian singer Kristiansen failed during Thursday's semi-final to get enough votes for Laika Party, which imagines the Soviet space dog as alive, while Malta's high-energy diva Conte did progress to the final with Serving.
As one of the 'big five' along with the UK, Spain, France and Germany, Italian singer Corsi did not have to compete in earlier bouts.
He did perform his glam rock track Volevo Essere Un Duro (I Wanted To Be A Tough Guy) on Tuesday night.
Norton said: 'I know nothing about the plans for the grand final yet, but when it's a country like Switzerland that haven't hosted for 36 years, I suspect they are going to pull out all the stops. I can't wait to see what they have in store.'
There has been some speculation that Canadian singer Celine Dion, who won for the Swiss with Ne Partez Pas Sans Moi in Dublin 1988, would perform in the grand final.
One confirmed act is last year's winner Swiss singer Nemo, who triumphed with The Code, and will perform their new song Unexplainable during the event.
Norton said: 'To be honest I love everything about Eurovision. It's scale and sincerity are unmatched.
'The extreme range of musical styles and talents in the contest combined with the coming together of countries and fans makes it a contest like no other.'
The winner will be determined by a combination of points from national juries and viewer votes in the participating 26 countries, along with a separate rest of the world vote.
TV coverage for the final is provided by Norton, on BBC One at 8pm BST on Saturday, while British audiences can listen to BBC Radio 2 and BBC Sounds for live coverage with presenters Rylan Clark and Scott Mills.
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The Guardian
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Ronald Corp obituary
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The British discs featured the signature tunes to such classic radio and television programmes as The Archers, Music While You Work, Dr Finlay's Casebook and Desert Island Discs, with scores by Eric Coates, Ronald Binge and many others. His own music, though similarly easy on the ear, was generally more serious in tone, owing much to the English choral tradition; it was also mildly dissonant, with Benjamin Britten, Holstian bitonality and Martinů among the notable influences. Corp's aim in founding the New London Children's Choir was to involve children in the performance of music both traditional and contemporary. To that end, he both commissioned pieces by such composers as Michael Nyman and Louis Andriessen (both patrons of the choir) and wrote many himself. The choir made multiple appearances at the BBC Proms and at other venues, as well as recording for film and television. Born in Wells, Somerset, the son of Geoffrey, a municipal gardener, and an amateur pianist and piano accordionist, and his wife, Elsie (nee Kinchin), Ronald began composing even before he learned to play the piano, using his own notation to remind himself of his intentions. After studying music at Oxford University, where Simon Preston was an important mentor, he worked for the BBC in London as a librarian, producer and presenter (1973–87). In 1999 he was ordained as a priest in the Church of England, serving as a non-stipendiary minister successively at St Mary's Kilburn, St Mary's Hendon and St Alban the Martyr, Holborn. A considerable proportion of his vocal works are settings of sacred texts or works by such poets as Gerard Manley Hopkins (Laudamus), George Herbert (Mary's Song), Francis Thompson (The Hound of Heaven) or John Ruskin (Nothing Can be Beautiful Which is Not True), reflecting his religious and ethical approach to life. 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And the thing I found fascinating — and we all know this, we all do it (I do it too sometimes) — is people are waiting to speak, and they're not listening. 'I think the profound difference between a good negotiator and a bad negotiator is: bad negotiators go in with an end in mind, and they have five points to make, and they will make them at any cost. Medium negotiators go in with five points in mind, and they'll make three, but they'll make them at any cost. The negotiator that's most successful goes in with five possible points in mind, but might not make any of them — because they are in a living, breathing situation, where they respond to the person opposite them on a human level and on a professional level. 'That really is the thing — to adapt, to listen, and to make sure that you've prepared in a way that means you can answer questions, but you're not just basically listening to your own voice and listening to your own points. That's where the most skilful negotiations are. I think it can be taught and learned. 'One of the interesting things I've learned while I've been a Visiting Senior Fellow at the London School of Economics is that, effectively, there are quite formal structures that people are used to — in professional life and in education — in terms of how they kind of are just conforming to things all the time, which is understandable, because people are frightened of risk. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'So one of the things that I do try to teach is to be, in a sense, a bit more informal, and to try and bring some more of somebody's professional self, their personality, a bit more of their humanity into the situation. 'Because if you imagine in a negotiation, someone might meet 100 people — it's very easy to forget 100 people, actually. So trying to be remembered for the right reasons, and showing a bit more of yourself and breaking down that kind of automated kind of response to things, can be very, very useful. 'Because the longer you've been in a profession — and I used to be a lawyer myself — the more inauthentic, in a sense, you feel. So that's one of the things that I teach to the students, and by the end of it, a lot of them are quite different from when they first met me, in terms of how they interact.' This exclusive interview with Sam McAlister was conducted by Roxanna Hayes of The Motivational Speakers Agency. For More Information: Champions Media & Journalism Speakers
