Oklahoma K-Pop Singer Won ‘American Song Contest’

The US singer AleXa, who lives in South Korea, has won the first “American Song Contest” for her home state of Oklahoma. On Monday evening (local time) she scored 710 points with the pop song “Wonderland” and was particularly well ahead in viewer voting. Colorado came second with 503 points, represented by pop singer Riker Lynch with “Feel The Love”, followed by Jordan Smith for Kentucky with the ballad “Sparrow” and 407 points.

The most famous contestant in the finals, soul singer Michael Bolton, landed seventh for Connecticut with “Beautiful World”. The US offshoot of the “Eurovision Song Contest” (ESC) ended on Monday following five preliminary rounds, two semifinals and a final with ten of the original 56 songs.

Contributions came from the 50 US states, the District of Columbia with the capital Washington and the five territories American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands. The ASC, moderated by singer Kelly Clarkson and rapper Snoop Dogg, suffered from weak ratings at its premiere. After almost three million people were watching at the start, the number of viewers fell to only around half in the weeks that followed.

The range of songs, which are often very suitable for the radio, with a large focus on pop and country, was significantly less influenced by regional characteristics than at the ESC in Europe. This starts on Tuesday with the first semi-final in Turin, followed by the second semi-final on Thursday and the final on Saturday. Austria’s contribution “Halo” by the duo LUM!X and Pia Maria is in the first semi-final.