Musical roots: Austria's JJ opens up on Eurovision 2025 win, dream collaborators and what comes next
Euronews Culture sat down with JJ, Austria’s Eurovision 2025 winner to talk about life since his triumphant performance, his genre-blending high pitched singing voice and what he’s planning to do next.
READ MORE : http://www.euronews.com/2025/06/22/musical-roots-austrias-jj-opens-up-on-eurovision-2025-win-dream-collaborators-and-what-com
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00:00Hi everybody, JJ here, and you're watching the Euronews Culture.
00:17Looking back from now, it's kind of like a big blur because everything has been going so fast that you didn't even have time to process what just happened.
00:27When they announced 178, my team and I were just freaking out.
00:31And there's a video on social media where you could see them flinging me around as if I were a fidget toy,
00:36and then pushing me to go because I had to go back on stage.
00:39But it was also such a blur because so much happened at once and I was full of adrenaline, full of emotion.
00:44I felt every emotion you could think of. And yeah, I was just constantly sobbing.
00:57After going through puberty, I realized that I still had a high singing voice.
01:03And I thought to myself, it would be a cool party trick if I imitated a soprano.
01:08And I was like, yeah, let's just sing high notes.
01:12And then I started to teach myself through listening to audio recordings by Maria Callas and Monserrat Caballet on YouTube.
01:20And since I love to imitate voices and sounds, I just tried to recreate how they would project their voices.
01:26And that's how I just started to learn how to sing classically.
01:31And then Mariah Carey was also a big influence.
01:34But generally the 90s divas, so Celine, Whitney, they were a huge part of my life.
01:39Because my older sister and my mom loved to listen to the 90s divas.
01:44And then obviously listening to the radio a lot, I loved Ariana Grande then too.
01:51So we were like a mix. And now, especially with the EDM electronic part,
01:56my love for Charli XAX grew even more with her Brad album.
02:06It was the three of us at the studio.
02:08Thea, the songwriter, Thomas, the producer and I.
02:11And we never worked together.
02:13So this was the first time that we worked together.
02:15They had no experience with classical music.
02:17And that was my first experience being in a recording studio.
02:21So that we just let our creative minds flow.
02:24And we knew we wanted to switch up.
02:26We wanted something to, you know, gag the people.
02:29And then our producer Thomas was like, what about techno?
02:32And then Tay and I were like, okay, we'll see.
02:36We had a quick bathroom break.
02:38And while we were having the bathroom break,
02:40he already put in some of the EDM techno elements.
02:43And then when we came back, he was like, guys, I did something.
02:47And then he showed it to us and we were like, wow, this slaps.
02:50And then we just kept it from that day on.
02:52After the entire European press and promotion tour,
02:59I'm going to head right back into the studio when I get back and make new music.
03:05So fun being in the studio and to experiment a little bit.
03:08We have enough time and we're going to let Wasted Love have its deserved hype.
03:12And while that's going on, I'm going to head right back into the studio.
03:16I'll definitely keep my operatic sound because that's my USP.
03:20That's what people know me for.
03:22And I want to keep my, you know, musical beginnings with me.
03:25But we'll see how commercial we could go or experiment with what others switch up
