Eurovision Song Contest 2006 Hallelujah" was the first ever hard rock song to win the contest, since Eurovision is normally associated with softer pop music and schlager. This was Finland's first victory in Eurovision after waiting forty-five years. It is also noted that they scored the same amount of points in the semi-final and the grand final. The hosts of the Eurovision Song Contest in Athens were Greek singer Sakis Rouvas, the Greek representative at Eurovision in 2004 and 2009, and the Greek American television presenter and actress, Maria Menounos. In the semi-final, both the hosts sang Katrina and the Waves' contest-winning "Love Shine
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