OGAE (French: Organisation générale des Amateurs de l'Eurovision, literally General Organization of the amateurs of Eurovision or General Organization of the fans of Eurovision) is the international fan club of the Eurovision Song Contest. It has branches in 37 European countries.
Although the Eurovision Song Contest started in 1956, OGAE began only in 1984 in Finland. All countries that take part or have already taken part in the Eurovision Song Contest can have their own OGAE and most of them do, as does Lebanon. Surprisingly, Italy (absent from ESC since 1997) has an own OGAE club. All other countries around the world are united under OGAE Rest of World, created in 2004.
Every year, the organisation puts together four non-profit competitions (Song Contest, Second Chance Contest, Video Contest and Home Composed Song Contest).
The purpose is to spread national popular music throughout the world and to exercise co-operation over the OGAE network of clubs, cooperation among the Eurovision Song Contest fans, promotion of the Eurovision Song Contest, and establishment of strong relations with national broadcasting companies.
OGAE AZERBAIJAN
President : Fariz Gasimli
Vice-president : Omar Abdulkerimov
Founders : Ruslan Ismayil-Zade, Fariz Gasimli, Rufat, Omar Abdulkerimov
OGAE Azerbaijan was set up at 1 April 2008 by a young Eurovision song contest admirer.
The idea of its creation came to his mind one month to go before the national final, named “Land of fire”, when the contest four candidates saw each other for the first time and got acquainted.
The country`s image improvement and promotion of Azerbaijan and Azerbaijani culture at Eurovision, also promotion of Eurovision song contest itself in Azerbaijan are the main objectives of OGAE Azerbaijan club.
In this respect the club reached significant success. For the last two years OGAE Azerbaijan club`s volunteers went to Eurovision song contest and supported our participants.
As you may know, for the OGAE clubs the European Broadcasting Union issued special tickets for the seats just next to the stage, in so-called fan-zone. Such tickets are not in free sale in customary cashiers so the lots of Azerbaijani flags especially in fan-zones also promote the image of Azerbaijan at this contest.
OGAE Azerbaijan appeared repeatedly at TV shows and also arranged various euro-parties together with the participants of the national selections. Unfortunately, because of the fact that the major of the volunteers go to school abroad, the club cannot fulfill most of its mighty plans.
Moreover, OGAE Azerbaijan participate in various musical contests, the largest one of them is the OGAE song contest. More than 30 clubs from different European countries are involved in this song contest which is highlighted by the lead websites, dedicated to the Eurovision song contest. Thereby the club promotes the modern Azerbaijani music.
The official website of Ogae Azerbaijan - www.ogae.az
