Islanders at Eurovision

As it will very soon be time for the Eurovision Song Contest, I asked myself, have there been any islanders involved in the event over the years? I don’t mean islanders representing island states like Malta, Iceland, Ireland or Cyprus. That would be too obvious! I mean unexpected islanders, such as contestants from the Faroe Islands or Bornholm or Greenland representing Denmark? Or perhaps, musicians from the Scottish islands appearing in the spotlight? Well indeed there have been!

For example, there have been two Faroe Islanders involved in the 2020s so far. As the Faroe Islands do not compete as independent Eurovision participants, Faroese artists represent Denmark in the contest.

Reiley: “Breaking My Heart”, Denmark, 2023

In 2023, Reiley became the first Faroese artist to represent Denmark at Eurovision. Born Rani Johann Petersen in Tórshavn. His song, “Breaking My Heart”, won the Dansk Melodi Grand Prix 2023. The Danish final was decided after a superfinal, in which Reiley secured victory with 43% of the vote. The song itself was a polished piece of pastel-coloured electropop: light, synthetic, emotionally direct, and framed by a visual style definitely closer to TikTok-era pop than to the old national-ballad tradition. This matters because it unsettles a cliché. Islanders at Eurovision don’t have to arrive wrapped in heritage. They may arrive as the most modern figures in the room. Unfortunately, however, at Eurovision 2023 in Liverpool, “Breaking My Heart” did not qualify for the Grand Final. Reiley finished 14th in the second semi-final with 6 points. Yet his result should not be measured only by points. His participation established a new symbolic route: the Faroes could appear at Eurovision not as a curiosity, but as part of Denmark’s mainstream pop representation.

Sissal: “Hallucination”, Denmark, 2025

Two years later came Sissal, another Faroese artist from Tórshavn. Eurovision’s official biography describes her as originally from Tórshavn in the Faroe Islands, though she now lives in Copenhagen, and notes that she first performed on stage at the age of ten. Her full name is Sissal Jóhanna Norðberg Niclasen, and she represented Denmark at Eurovision 2025 with “Hallucination”.

If Reiley’s Eurovision story was one of arrival, Sissal’s was one of consolidation. She won the Dansk Melodi Grand Prix 2025. Her song was sleek, dramatic and vocally expansive, moving in a more forceful dance-pop direction than Reiley’s lighter 2023 entry. Its title suggested altered perception, emotional intensity and sensory disorientation.

Competitively, Sissal went further than Reiley. “Hallucination” qualified for the Grand Final and finished 23rd with 47 points. In Faroese Eurovision terms, this was significant: she became not merely another Faroese artist selected by Denmark, but a Faroese artist who carried Denmark into the final. She has quite a presence!

Bornholm and the travelling singer: Soluna Samay, 2012

Denmark has also been represented by a singer from Bornholm, a beautiful island in the Baltic Sea. Soluna Samay, Denmark’s representative in 2012, was originally born in Guatemala City and is of German-Swiss background, but she moved to the island as a child after her parents bought a small farm there. Eurovision’s official biography presented her under the appealing phrase “from busker to winner of the Danish Melodi Grand Prix”.

Soluna represented Denmark with “Should’ve Known Better” at Eurovision 2012 in Baku. The song was written by Remee, Isam B and Chief 1, and she won Dansk Melodi Grand Prix 2012 before travelling to Azerbaijan. Her Eurovision result was mixed. She qualified from the first semi-final, finishing 9th, but then came 23rd in the Grand Final with 21 points. The same position as Sissal, not bad at all.

Orkney on the Eurovision-winning stage: Aimée Leonard and “The Voice”

The most striking Scottish island link is not a lead singer, but a musician within a winning Eurovision performance. Aimée Leonard, an Orcadian musician, singer, voice coach and bodhrán player, performed backing vocals and bodhrán with the Irish delegation in the 1996 Eurovision Song Contest in Oslo, when Eimear Quinn won for Ireland with “The Voice”. The song was written by Brendan Graham, and it won the contest with 162 points, giving Ireland its seventh Eurovision victory. It remains Ireland’s most recent Eurovision win.

It would be misleading to present Leonard as the Eurovision entrant in the same sense as Eimear Quinn, or indeed Sissal or Soluna. She was not the named lead artist. But she was part of the live Eurovision performance of a winning song. Go Orkney!

Interestingly, the same year saw a rare Hebridean connection. Karen Matheson, the extraordinary Gaelic singer, and the lead singer of Capercaillie, whose mother was from Barra, performed for France. She joined Dan Ar Braz and Elaine Morgan for “Diwanit Bugale.” This remains the only song in Eurovision history performed in Breton. Definitely worth a relisten, unlike many Eurovision songs! The Scottish islands were well represented that year!

Greenland: close to Eurovision, but not quite there yet

Greenlanders very nearly represented Denmark with Julie & Nina, who competed in Dansk Melodi Grand Prix 2019 with “League of Light”. The song was performed in English and Greenlandic, and EurovisionWorld records that it finished second in the superfinal, with 35% overall compared with the winner’s result. Julie & Nina would have represented Denmark if the result had been decided entirely by the public vote as their entry gained strong public support.

The entry’s use of Greenlandic gave the song a cultural force that exceeded its competitive fate. The very idea of Greenlandic language in a Danish Eurovision selection carried representational weight. It asked, implicitly, who gets to appear under the Danish flag, and which parts of the Danish realm are permitted to sing themselves into European visibility.

Greenland has therefore not yet produced a confirmed Eurovision main-stage performer in the way the Faroes have done through Reiley and Sissal. But it has produced one of the most interesting near-misses: an Arctic island entry that the public seems to have embraced, yet which did not ultimately pass through the selection mechanism. Give it a listen

Conclusion: Eurovision as archipelago

Eurovision is usually watched as a contest of flags, ad we all know about neighbours being neighbourly with their votes! But if we look more closely the islanders are there, though not always where we expect them. They may stand beneath Denmark’s name while carrying the Faroe Islands into the contest. They may come from Bornholm by way of Guatemala and the busking routes of Europe. They may beat the bodhrán in the background of Ireland’s last Eurovision triumph. They may sing in Greenlandic in a Danish national final and nearly reach the stage. I wonder if in the near future we will see more islanders taking part, watch and see! And will the Faroe Islands and Greenland soon be representing themselves? Only time will tell! I suppose I’ll watch the event again this year, and see if there are any islanders hidden in plain sight!