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Eurovision Contestants 2015: Montenegro

Nenad Knezevic Knez, a.k.a. Knez, is one of Montenegro's most popular artists. He started his career in 1992 and has produced 10 successful albums. This year, the 47-year-old singer will represent his country at the Eurovision song contest with the song “Adio.” For those who don’t understand Montenegrin, this ballad is about a relationship that doesn't end well, and about unrequited love — which seems to be one of the favorite themes this year. Perfect for all the violins and the women singing along with Knez.


The country became independent in 2006 and participated for the first time in the contest the following year. Since then, there's been only two songs in English, as Montenegro's artists generally prefer to sing in Montenegrin.

In the video, Knez also takes us on a nice tour of Montenegro. Its forests, mountains and Knez’s green and black velvet jacket have apparently convinced our team of expert judges to award him (for now) the lead spot in the competition!

Our vote:

Does it make you want to visit that country? 9.25/10

Was there enough glitter? 3.5/10

Ok to quit your day job? 2.25/10

OVERALL AVERAGE: 5/10

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LGBTQ Plus

Bravo! Brava! Opera's Overdue Embrace Of Trans Performers And Storylines

Opera has played with ideas of gender since its earliest days. Now the first openly trans performers are taking to the stage, and operas explicitly exploring trans identities are beginning to emerge.

A photograph of Lucia Lucas singing with a lance, dressed in a black gown.

September 2022: Lucia Lucas performing at the opera

Lucia Lucas/Facebook
Von Manuel Brug

BERLIN — The figure of the nurse Arnalta is almost as old as opera itself. In Claudio Monteverdi’s saucy Roman sex comedy The Coronation of Poppaea, this motherly confidante spurs the eponymous heroine on to ever more lustful encounters, singing her advice in the voice of a tenor. The tradition of a man playing an older woman in a comic role can be traced all the way back to the comedies of the ancient world, which Renaissance-era writers looked to for inspiration.

The Popes in Baroque Rome decreed that, supposedly for religious reasons, women should not sing on stage. But they still enjoyed the spectacular performances of castratos, supporting them as patrons and sometimes even acting as librettists. The tradition continues today in the form of celebrated countertenors, and some male sopranos perform in female costume.

“I don’t know what I am, or what I’m doing.” This is how the pageboy Cherubino expresses his confusion at the flood of hormones he is experiencing in his aria in Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro – one of the most popular operas of all time, full of amorous adventures and sexual misunderstandings. Cherubino cannot and does not want to choose between a countess, a lady’s maid, and a gardener’s daughter. He sometimes wears women’s clothing himself, and in modern productions the music teacher even chases after the young man.

The role of Cherubino, the lustful teenager caught between childhood and manhood, someone who appears trapped in the "wrong
body, is traditionally performed by a woman, usually a mezzosoprano. The audience is used to this convention, also seen in Richard Strauss’s Rosenkavalier or Siegfried Matthus’s Cornet Christoph Rilke’s Song of Love and Death, first performed in 1984.

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