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Markus Riva

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Markus Riva
Riva in July 2017
Riva in July 2017
Background information
Birth nameMiķelis Ļaksa
Born (1986-10-02) 2 October 1986 (age 38)
Talsi, Latvia
GenresPop
OccupationSinger
InstrumentVocals
Years active2009–present
Websitewww.markus-riva.com

Miķelis Ļaksa (born 2 October 1986), known professionally as Markus Riva, is a Latvian singer. He has released several albums, including the debut album Ticu (2009).

Riva worked at Capital FM as a DJ, and has composed music for various television shows. Among creative inspirations, he mentions artists such as Beyoncé, Robyn and Woody Allen.

Career

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2014–2023: Dziesma, Supernova and X Faktors

[edit]

He has competed repeatedly in Latvia's national selection for the Eurovision Song Contest. He has entered the Latvian national selection for the past eight editions in a row. His first national selection entry was in 2014, when he entered the national selection Dziesma 2014 with the song "Lights On", with which he qualified to the final, where he placed 11th and therefore didn't qualify to the superfinal of the competition.[1] In 2015, Riva released his first single in Russian titled "Taty", the video for the single was made by director Alan Badoev. In 2015 he again entered the selection, now called Supernova with a new format. He returned with his song "Take Me Down", the English version of "Taty", which went on to place second in the final, behind the eventual winner Aminata's song "Love Injected".[2] In 2016, Riva entered with his song "I Can", and came third in the semi-final, however since he was in neither the top two in the jury voting or the televote, he did not reach the final.[3]

An exponent of the Ape Music, since 2017 Riva has been hosting X Faktors, the Latvian version of The X Factor.[4] The same year, Riva again participated in Supernova, this time with the song "Dynamite". He failed to qualify from the second heat, finishing in sixth place.[5] In 2018, Riva entered again with the song "This Time". Originally, he was said to have failed to qualify from his semi-final, however due to technical errors in the voting he would have qualified over Ritvars' song "Who's Counting", so both songs were sent through to the final.[6] In the final, Riva placed fifth out of eight entries.[7] In 2019, he participated in Supernova with his song "You Make Me So Crazy".[8] Having qualified from the semi-final, he placed second out of 8 entries, behind the eventual winner Carousel's song "That Night".[9] In 2020, he returned for a seventh consecutive year with the song "Impossible", co-written by Aminata. He was not selected to participate following an audition round.[10] He returned to Supernova in 2022 with the song "If You're Gonna Love Me", but didn't qualify to the final.[11] In 2023, he was selected once again to perform the song "Forever", which qualified to the final and placed fourth.[12]

Participations in Latvia's Eurovision National Final

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Table key
1
 Winner
2
 Second place
3
 Third place
X
 Entry selected but did not compete
†
 Upcoming
Contest Song Final Points Semi Points
Dziesma 2014 "Lights On" 11th 20 5th 18
Supernova 2015 "Take Me Down" 2nd 15750 Jury qualifier
Supernova 2016 "I Can" Not qualified 3rd 2909
Supernova 2017 "Dynamite" Eliminated at Heat stage
Supernova 2018 "This Time" 5th 10 2nd 4
Supernova 2019 "You Make Me So Crazy" 2nd 6 3rd 6
Supernova 2020 "Impossible" Eliminated at Live audition round
Supernova 2022 "If You're Gonna Love Me" Not qualified Not revealed
Supernova 2023 "Forever" 4th 14 Not revealed
Supernova 2025 "Bigger than This"

Discography

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Studio albums

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  • Ticu (2009)
  • Songs from NYC (2010)
  • How It Feels (2013)
  • MR (2015)
  • I CAN (2018)
  • Laika Upe (2019)

Singles

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  • "Fire" (2013)
  • "We Dance for Reason" (2014)
  • "Lights On" (2014)
  • "Forever" (2014)
  • "Take Me Down" (2014)
  • "Таты" (2015)
  • "Красива сильно" (feat. Arthur Dennys) (2015)
  • "Take Me Away" (2015)
  • "I Can" (2016)
  • "Love Me Harder" (2016)
  • "Laika Upe" (2016)
  • "Ты влюблена" (2016)
  • "Saucu Tevi Vēl" (2016)
  • "Река любви" (2016)
  • "Dynamite" (2017)
  • "Девушка с глянца" (2017)
  • "Ko sirds mana jūt" (2017)
  • "Южные ветра" (feat. Arthur Dennys) (2017)
  • "Не зови" (2017)
  • "Kā būs, tā būs" (2017)
  • "This Time" (2017)
  • "Ziemassvētkos" (2017)
  • "Куда ночь заведёт" (2018)
  • "Nevaru Tā" (2018)
  • "Last Dance" (with Aminata) (2018)
  • "По венам алкоголь" / "You Make Me So Crazy" (2018)
  • "Es Tev Šodien Teikšu Jā" (with Intars Busulis and Reinis Sējāns) (2019)
  • "Kamēr Vien Mēs Esam" (with Dināra Rudāne) (2019)
  • "Ты пьёшь мою кровь" (2019)
  • "Не владею собой" (2019)
  • "Пьяная голая" (2019)
  • "Impossible" (2020)
  • "If You're Gonna Love Me" (2022)

Charted Singles

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List of charted singles as lead artist, showing album name and year released
Title Year Peak chart positions Album
LAT
Air.
[13] 		CIS
Air.
[14] 		UKR
Air.
[15]
"Ne vidpuskay"
(with Myata [uk]) 		2018 * 191 7 Tam, de ray
"Svadhisthana" — 21 Non-album singles
"One Night"
(with Myszkovski) 		2023 6 — —
"Too Late for Love"
(with Myszkovski) 		2024 9 — —
"Far From Me" 21 — —
"—" denotes items which were not released in that country or failed to chart.
"*" denotes the chart did not exist at that time.

References

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  1. ^ "Final Dziesma voting results revealed". ESCXTRA.com. 24 February 2014. Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  2. ^ "Aminata to represent Latvia in Vienna". eurovision.tv. 22 February 2015. Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  3. ^ "Latvia: The four songs through to the Supernova final". eurovision.tv. 21 February 2016. Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  4. ^ "Latvijas 'X Faktoru' vadīs Markus Riva" (in Latvian). DELFI. 8 May 2017. Retrieved 25 February 2018.
  5. ^ "Nolikums Par dziesmu un izpildītāju atlasi LTV konkursam "Supernova 2017"" (PDF). Supernova.lsm.lv (in Latvian). Latvijas Televīzija. 16 August 2016. Retrieved 10 September 2016.
  6. ^ "Supernova results overturned!". ESCBubble. 12 February 2018. Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  7. ^ "Šogad Latviju Eirovīzijā pārstāvēs Laura Rizzotto". www.lsm.lv (in Latvian). Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  8. ^ Christou, Costa (9 January 2019). "Latvia: Supernova 2019 entries get revamped ahead of selection". ESCXtra. Retrieved 21 September 2019.
  9. ^ "LTV Ziņu Dienests - Atklājam Supernova 2019 fināla žūrijas un skatītāju visu balsojumu rezultātus. Carousel, Markus Riva, Laime Pilnīga, Double Faced Eels, Dziļi violets, Edgars Kreilis, Samanta Tīna, Aivo Oskis | Facebook". www.facebook.com. Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  10. ^ "Latvia chooses Samanta Tīna for Eurovision 2020". 8 February 2020.
  11. ^ Granger, Anthony (5 February 2022). "🇱🇻 Latvia: Supernova 2022 Semi-Final Results". Eurovoix. Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  12. ^ Eng.LSM.lv (5 February 2023). "Ten Supernova finalists revealed". Eng.LSM.lv. Public Broadcasting of Latvia. Retrieved 11 February 2023.
  13. ^ Peak chart positions for singles in Latvian Airplay:
  14. ^ Peak chart positions for singles in Commonwealth of Independent States Airplay:
  15. ^ Peak chart positions for singles in Ukrainian Airplay:
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