Overnight, Armenian public broadcaster AMPTV revealed that they have internally selected the band Ladaniva to represent Armenia at the Eurovision Song Contest in Malmö, Sweden!
Ladaniva is a multicultural band founded in 2019 by Armenian singer Jaklin Baghdasaryan and French multi-instrumentalist Louis Thomas.
Jaklin Baghdasaryan was born in Egheghnazor, Armenia, and grew up in Minsk, Belarus before emigrating to France in 2014 with her mother. The singer's connection to Armenia has remained strong over the years; in an interview with Fox 11 Los Angeles, she said:
"I was always in the Armenian community. I did Armenian dance, singing Armenian songs and for me it was my nostalgia to my roots, and I always wanted to sing in Armenian, to dance it, to participate in our culture,"
Born in France to a family of musicians including his mother who was a classical pianist, Louis Thomas began playing the trumpet when he was seven years old.
The two musicians both attended the Lille Conservatory and met at a bar in Vieux-Lille during a jazz jam session one night in 2018. Singer Jaklin Baghdasaryan told Fox 11 Los Angeles:
"Louie was playing trumpet, and I was singing. And after we started to do the jazz together, and also we did our study in our conservatory together. And after one day, Louis heard that I am singing in Armenia. And he said, ‘let's do something with this,’ because he loved Armenian language and music."
Ladaniva's sound mixes influences from all around the world and is described as "world music with a fresh touch of Armenian folk and other traditional forms including maloya, Balkanbeat, reggae, Arabic, and African influences." The inspiration behind the band's name was the name of a Russian car that the fathers of both band members owned during the latter's childhoods.
Ladaniva rose to fame with their song 'Vay Aman', which became a hit in Armenia and went viral online, receiving over 2 million views on YouTube.
Since their viral beginnings, Ladaniva's star has continued to rise, with the band winning the Public Choice Award at the 2022 Music Moves Europe Awards. Ladaniva released their self-titled debut album in September 2023, which includes tracks in Armenian, French, and Russian.
Ladaniva's Eurovision entry is due to be released in the coming days.
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