Love Shine a Light branch of the Samaritans. In a 1997 interview Katrina and the Waves lead vocalist Katrina Leskanich indicated that it was members of the Samaritans who opined that "Love Shine a Light" "was the type of song which would win the Eurovision Song Contest and [so] at the last minute, [Katrina and the Waves] submitted the song with our £250 [entrance fee]" for consideration to vie in the "", the national preselection round for the UK in Eurovision 1997. It was also reported that Carmina Cooper, the manager of Katrina and the Waves and the wife of Alex Cooper, met up
Turkey in the Eurovision Song Contest years, first time being in the 1996 Contest where she qualified to the final and placed 12th and in the 1997 Contest she placed third, behind the UK and Ireland, with the song "Dinle" (literally "Listen"), sung in Turkish. After the free language rule was re-introduced in 1999, the first Turkish entry to be partially sung in English, was at the contest. Turkey reached to the top ten second time since 1986 and first time to the top three, so that was the most successful result that the country ever had in the Eurovision Song Contest until their victory in