Mia Nicolai and Dion Cooper literally walk ‘into the emotion’ at the Eurovision Song Contest. On their black turntable in a kind of eye of white light and smoke, the Dutch Eurovision entry is sober but dreamily warm, as evidenced by the first rehearsals for the major live show in the Liverpool Arena. The song ‘Burning Daylight’, which they will perform as the fourteenth in the semi-final on Tuesday evening, is all about camera work. While the duo walk around each other, eyes focused on each other, heads towards each other or turned away from each other in circles, it’s the close-ups that do it. And yes, their improved vocals: a bit hesitant, but okay. That the song went to a different pitch after a few excruciatingly false performances has given the singers confidence.
After the previous (successful) performances by The Common Linnets and Duncan Laurence, it is therefore again ‘purity’ on which the Netherlands is committed. Quiet beams of white stage light, a single rainbow sparkle and the singers in black, glitter-trimmed clothing by designer Kit Wan. This is how the song can unfold as hoped: from a dark beginning to a more hopeful and optimistic future with mixing voices. The message: a person stumbles more than once, we can waste our time (“burning daylight”), but it is never too late to start again. The discharge, via the sing-along “goodbye old life”, is also visible. Together the two dance more freely.
‘Burning Daylight’ carries an ambivalent, personal story for Mia Nicolai (27) and Dion Cooper (29), in which both old memories and setbacks are processed. That took on even more significance these weeks because its implementation failed so miserably. Painfully, the duo fell through the ice at the two Eurovision concerts – one in Madrid, the second in the Afas Live in Amsterdam – which warm up for the annual European singing festival. It became clear how inexperienced the two still were together as performers for a large audience: unsteady, both too high in their breath and clumsy with the in-ears.
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Meditation and ice baths
The criticism of their performances was harsh and the recordings went viral. The call for the return of a National Song Contest, a preselection that had been abolished since Anouk’s participation in 2013, swelled. Broadcaster AVROTROS kept it to ‘technical problems’. But on the television program Khalid & Sophie, the duo admitted that they had “fought” with the song written by Duncan Laurence for the past six months because it was “very difficult for their voices to perform”. The solution, with producer Gordon Groothedde, was to change the key – a tone and a half higher, attention to the head voice, the outbursts safer.
In addition, the act has become more serene. Now that they are facing each other, as Ilse DeLange and Waylon successfully did when the Common Linnets did, the song exudes more intensity. Previously, they bounced all over the stage.
The criticism has hit them hard, they said. Cooper felt that “everyone had hated them.” And Nicolai also indicated on television that the hate was ‘triggering’ for her, because she has a bullying past. They found peace and distraction in meditation, self-help books, ice baths with breathing training (Cooper) and boxing training (Nicolai). The bond between them has become closer. Put together by Duncan Laurence, they didn’t know each other before.
Dion Cooper, actually Dion Cuiper from Wassenaar, is a singer-songwriter with his own band that only really started as an ‘artist’ in 2020. In 2021 he released his EP ‘Too Young Too Dumb’. He was the support act for Duncan Laurence, who also co-wrote his single ‘Blue Jeans’.
Mia Nicolai from Amsterdam has been working on her own music (electropop) in Los Angeles for the past year. She too has only released music since 2020. Her Russian mother makes art and music, her father Peter Nicolaï is a lawyer and politician (PvdD).
Sweden: top favourite
On Tuesday evening the Norwegian Alessandra kicks off the first semi-final with her ‘Queen of Kings’. Singer Loreen from Sweden has been a top favorite for a long time, she once again put on a very strong act at rehearsals on Monday. Mia and Dion are fourteenth, just before Käärijä from Finland ends the evening with the tinny ‘Cha Cha Cha’. For the first time, the fifteen countries will hear on stage whether they are through to the final on Saturday, ten acts will continue.
The tinkering with the Dutch song has not yet had much effect on the polls. It’s all about tension – the bookmakers don’t give them much of a chance.
But the fact that the field of participants is musically on the thin side in this first semi-final may turn out positively for Mia and Dion.