It’s the night that NBC has been looking forward too all season long, the final night of the American Song Contest! Eight weeks ago the contest began with 56 total entries from the 50 U.S. states, 5 territories, and the District of Colombia. Following five qualifier rounds and two semi-finals, that field of entries was cut down to just 10 remaining songs.
As always the running order was decided prior to tonight’s episode and would see Connecticut open the show and Colorado close. The full running order was as follows:
- Connecticut – Michael Bolton “Beautiful World”
- North Dakota – Chloe Fredericks “Can’t Make You Love Me”
- Texas – Grant Knoche “Mr. Independent”
- Alabama – Ni/Co “The Difference”
- Kentucky – Jordan Smith “Sparrow”
- Washington – “Allen Stone “A Bit of Both”
- American Samoa – Tenelle “Full Circle”
- Oklahoma – AleXa “Wonderland”
- Tennessee – Tyler Braden “Seventeen”
- Colorado – Riker Lynch “Feel the Love”
At the top of the show it was announced that Washington’s Allen Stone would not be performing his entry live in the arena due to a personal emergency, but they were able to pre-record the performance and play it back for tonight’s episode.
The Winning Prizes revealed
The contest also revealed that the winnner would be winning more than just a rotation slot on iHeart Radio, but would also be the recipient of a gold version of the Eurovision crystal microphone trophy. They would also receive the honor of having their song played during a T-Mobile ad over the next few months, earning them plays, royalties, and national exposure after the contest.
Kelly revealed as well that the winner would be appearing on the Billboard Music Awards show this coming Sunday night, earning the winning artist even more exposure. Winning the contest just got that much sweeter for these 10 acts.
That's an American Eurovision trophy all right! #americansongcontest pic.twitter.com/mtfUaH8PVv
— up in space, Dan 👩🚀 | 🇬🇧🇸🇪🇪🇸 (@vDanDesign) May 10, 2022
The Voting Structure for the Final
Snoop Dogg revealed after Michael Bolton’s performance that the final would utilize a Eurovision style voting system for every state, with the public and jurors assigning 12 points to their favorite song, and 1 point to their least favorite. They also grouped the juries into regions, likely to counter balance regional taste or bias similar to how a country’s jury are counter-balanced in Eurovision. The spokespeople for the juries were ASC competitors Yam House (MN), Almira Zaky (VA), Jared Lee (MA), Alisabeth Von Presley (IA), Ryan Charles (WY), Ale Zabala (FL), Nitro Nitra (DE), Jason J (GU), Savannah Keyes (UT), and Bronson Varde (HI).
The regions for the juries were as follows:
- Lower South – Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee
- Mid Atlantic – Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvannia, Washington D.C.
- Midwest – Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin
- Mountains – Colorado, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming
- New England – Connecticut, Maine, Massachussets, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont
- Pacific West – Alaska, California, Hawaii, Oregon, and Washington
- Plains – Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma
- Southwest – Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, Texas
- Territories – American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands Puerto Rico, US. Virgin Islands
- Upper South – Kentucky, North Carolina and South Carolina, West Virginia, Virginia
The Final Results
Despite not being in the studio, Washington’s Allen Stone took a large lead by earning 6 of the 10 jury region’s 12 points and held 105 total points. In second was Tennessee’s Tyler Braden with 88, and in third was Kentucky’s Jordan Smith with 79 points. The full breakdown of voting was as follows:
| WA | TN | KY | AL | OK | ND | TX | CT | AS | CO | |
| Lower South | 10 | 8 | 12 | 7 | 1 | 4 | 3 | 6 | 5 | 2 |
| Mid Atlantic | 12 | 8 | 10 | 3 | 5 | 2 | 4 | 7 | 6 | 1 |
| Midwest | 12 | 8 | 4 | 6 | 5 | 7 | 10 | 1 | 3 | 2 |
| Mountains | 12 | 10 | 7 | 4 | 3 | 8 | 5 | 6 | 2 | 1 |
| New England | 12 | 7 | 10 | 6 | 8 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 4 |
| Pacific West | 12 | 7 | 8 | 10 | 3 | 6 | 1 | 2 | 5 | 4 |
| Plains | 7 | 6 | 8 | 12 | 10 | 3 | 5 | 1 | 2 | 4 |
| Southwest | 12 | 10 | 8 | 4 | 7 | 5 | 6 | 2 | 3 | 1 |
| Territories | 10 | 12 | 2 | 5 | 6 | 4 | 3 | 7 | 8 | 1 |
| Upper South | 6 | 12 | 10 | 3 | 8 | 4 | 2 | 7 | 1 | 5 |
| Total points | 105 | 88 | 79 | 60 | 56 | 48 | 42 | 40 | 37 | 25 |
Next up was the public votes from America, which held more weight in deciding the winner than the jury’s did. In the final, the American public assigned a total of 3,248 points across the 10 acts. The public voting results were revealed just as they would be in the Eurovision Song Contest, starting with the last ranked jury song, and moving to the first ranked jury song. Once the votes were announced, the entire scoreboard flipped, and would see AleXa blowing out her competition with a total of 654 televotes. The next highest televote would go to Riker Lynch with 478 points.
The full breakdown of the combined jury and televote points are as follows:
| OK | CO | KY | WA | TX | AS | CT | AL | ND | TN | |
| Lower South | 1 | 2 | 12 | 10 | 3 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 4 | 8 |
| Mid Atlantic | 5 | 1 | 10 | 12 | 4 | 6 | 7 | 3 | 2 | 8 |
| Midwest | 5 | 2 | 4 | 12 | 10 | 3 | 1 | 6 | 7 | 8 |
| Mountains | 3 | 1 | 7 | 12 | 5 | 2 | 6 | 4 | 8 | 10 |
| New England | 8 | 4 | 10 | 12 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 6 | 5 | 7 |
| Pacific West | 3 | 4 | 8 | 12 | 1 | 5 | 2 | 10 | 6 | 7 |
| Plains | 10 | 4 | 8 | 7 | 5 | 2 | 1 | 12 | 3 | 6 |
| Southwest | 7 | 1 | 8 | 12 | 6 | 3 | 2 | 4 | 5 | 10 |
| Territories | 6 | 1 | 2 | 10 | 3 | 8 | 7 | 5 | 4 | 12 |
| Upper South | 8 | 5 | 10 | 6 | 2 | 1 | 7 | 3 | 4 | 12 |
| Televote | 654 | 478 | 328 | 254 | 324 | 305 | 298 | 225 | 219 | 163 |
| Total points | 710 | 503 | 407 | 359 | 366 | 342 | 338 | 285 | 267 | 251 |
This means that Oklahoma’s AleXa has won the inaugural edition of the American Song Contest with her song “Wonderland”! In her thank you speech she not only thanked her dancers but also Kelly and Snoop, and the finalists of the contest.
What did #YOU think of the American Song Contest finale? Are #YOU excited about AleXa’s win? Let us know on social media @ESCUnited, on our discord, or on our forum page!
