Biography

Angelica Anatolyevna Yalinskaya (Russian: Анжелика Анатольевна Ялиньская, romanized: Anzhelika Anatol'yevna Yalin'skaya; Belarusian: Анжаліка Анатольеўна Ялінская, romanized: Anzhalika Anatoĺjeŭna Jalinskaja; born 17 May 1970), better known as Angelica Agurbash (Russian: Анжелика Агурбаш; Belarusian: Анжаліка Агурбаш), is a Belarusian singer and former model best known internationally for representing Belarus at the Eurovision Song Contest 2005. Agurbash was born the city of Minsk, Belarus, during the period the city was within the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic of the Soviet Union. In 1988, she won the first Miss Belarus title when she was a student of the Belarusian Academy of Arts. Between 1990 and 1995, she was in the band Verasy. In 1991, Angelica earned her second title "Miss Photo USSR" becoming the most photographed model in Belarus.After Angelica left Verasy, she has had numerous hit singles as well as releasing three albums – "Paper Moon", "Night Without a Dream" and "For You". In 2002, she presented her brand-new album "The Farewell Kiss of Lika Yalinskaya" the same year. Agurbash was the Belarusian Eurovision Song Contest entrant in 2005. Her original song, Boys and Girls, a rock ballad themed after the Beslan school hostage crisis, was chosen by a jury after a pre-selection vote by Belarusian viewers. However, due to the song's poor reception across Europe, the Belarusian state broadcaster decided in a highly unusual move to allow Angelica to sing a different song in Kyiv.

She ordered songs from two composers with successful Eurovision records: the Israeli author of 1998 winner Diva Svika Pick, and the author of Antique's hit Die For You Nikos Terzis. After long hesitation, Agurbash picked the Greek disco anthem Love Me Tonight. The song change succeeded in producing hype around the Belarusian entry, to which added also a transformer dress, inspired by Marie N's victory in 2002. She entered the show amongst the pre show favourites. However, in the contest she did not fare as well as expected, failing to make it past the semi-finals. "Love Me Tonight" ended 13th out of 25.