In 2003, another country entered the song contest: for the first time, the Ukraine participated and sent one of their biggest stars: Olexandr Ponomariov. In total, 26 countries took part in the Eurovision Song Contest in the Latvian capital of Riga which would mark a new Eurovision record. The famous Russian duo, t.A.T.u., decided to enter the contest and kept both the organisation and the press busy during the rehearsal week by not caring about rehearsal schedules and boycotting press conferences. Eventually, the alleged lesbian duo finished third after Turkey and Belgium.

Turkey won the contest for the first time after an exciting voting. The winner was not obvious before the last country, Slovenia, had delivered their votes which would give the victory to Sertab Erener, one of the biggest stars in Turkey. Sertab had studied at Turkish conservatoriums and had previously released lots of award-winning albums and had recorded duets with the likes of Ricky Martin and José Carreras. Her song Every Way That I Can was a combination of oriental melodies and pop and was specially re-mixed for the Eurovision Song Contest to make it more appealing to televoters.

The United Kingdom entry Cry Baby performed by the duo Jemini came in at a disappointing last place, scoring no points at all. The group claimed that there had been severe problems with the monitor speakers and that this was the reason why they performed so badly. It was the first time ever that an entry from the United Kingdom got the dreaded nil points. The Belgian song Sanomi by Urban Trad was one of the most interesting songs in recent Eurovision Song Contest history as it was sung in a made-up language. No-one had expected them to score that well though ending up in surprising second place.