schlager - the golden years

as we move on, we enter the years when countries were strictly allowed to compete in the eurovision song contest singing in their own language. i always found that part of the contest quite amusing and i believe it enhanced the musical focus. after all, a schlager really isn’t about the words. it’s about the melody. which incidentally brings us to the next schlager lesson.

step two: all good schlagers have a bridge, followed by a key change towards the end.

a bridge doesn’t really need to have anything to do with the rest of the song, and sometimes it's even awkward. the bridge is usually whipped out close before the end of the song and brings the tempo down for a while to enhance the comeback of the refrain. to closely follow the bridge with the classic schlager move of raising the key by one semitone certainly serves a purpose of giving the song a more powerful finale. these two tricks, and the key change in particular, have become part of what defines the genre.

to demonstrate step two i give you the eurovision song contest winner of ninety-one. and, well yes, you guessed it. it’s sweden again.