Has Slovakia found the formula for victory?

After six quarter-finals and two semi-finals, it was finally time for the final of the Slovak national selection for the 2010 Eurovision Song Contest on the 27th of February. The winner was decided through a combination of televoting and the verdict of an expert jury. As special guests of the show, Fabrizio Faniello and Claudia Faniello from Malta performed. 

In fact, there was a tie for the first place, with Kristína and Mista both reaching 23 points. In the end, 22-year-old Kristína Peláková won due to a higher placing in the televote with her ethnic pop song Horehronie, the lyrics of which were written by the famous national poet Kamil Peteraj and praise a mountainous region of Slovakia. 

Have a look at her entry below and if you want to see the Slovakian national final once more, check it out in our ESCTV player!

Who are they?

Kristína Peláková started her singing carrier with the single I'm Yours in 2007. One year later she released a debut album, which went platinum in her country. Her song videos reached 5,000,000 hits on YouTube! At the beginning of summer 2009 she started to work on her second album, from which the first single became number one that summer. At this moment her Eurovision Song Contest entry Horehronie is the number one radio hit in Slovakia. In the national rounds her winning was virtually uncontested as in the final round she received nearly 40 per cent of public votes.

Her song was written by Martin Kavulič, who's a famous composer in Slovakia. He specialises in pop and dance music, but he likes other genres too. Apart from producing he also plays guitar and piano. His co-operation with Kristina began a couple of years ago.

The lyrics of the song are written by Kamil Peteraj. He is a legendary Slovak poet, lyricist and screenwriter. He is well-known not only in Slovakia and the Czech Republic, but also in other nearby countries. He's the winner of the Slovak prestigious Pen Club Award as well as other literary awards.

Kamil Peteraj published 18 poetry books and is one of the best-selling Slovak poet. During his career he also wrote TV scripts and the movie song lyrics. He is considered to be the greatest lyrics writer in Slovakia, having released around 40 albums and selling more than 3 millions copies.

She'll perform fourth in the first Semi-Final on the 25th of May in Oslo, Norway.