JUST weeks ago, Jon Lilygreen was happily playing to audiences of around 50 people at Newport's Kama Lounge.

Now, the former Bettws High School pupil is poised to play to a potential TV audience of 650 million as the Cypriot entry in the Eurovision Song Contest.

As he told a Cypriot TV interviewer after the country's song Life Looks Better In Spring was selected for the Oslo semi-finals : "It's mental!"

The 22-year-old singer-songwriter's road to Eurovision started at Coleg Gwent's Cross Keys campus.

There, he met Norwegian-born musical theatre lecturer Sylvia Stand, who later set up a music production business with her partner.

The writers of the Cypriot song, Nasos Lambrianides and Melis Konstantinou, put an embryonic version of it on the internet looking for producers to polish it.

Ms Stand and her partner took it and got Mr Lilygreen to sing it. The writers were delighted with the results and entered it for Eurovision.

The song, sung in English, made the cut and Mr Lilygreen, along with Ms Stand on piano and other Wales-based musicians flew out to Nicosia for the heat.

"I didn't think we stood a chance," Mr Lilygreen said yesterday.

It was up against a song sung by the Cyprus X-Factor winner and a previous Cyprus entrant for Eurovision.

But as anxious family back home in Newport watched over the internet, the votes were cast and Mr Lilygreen's song came out the winner.

He said: "We were amazed, we had just gone out there to have a good time. Now, we're not really sure what's going to happen financially if they want us to go back to Cyprus to promote the song, but we will obviously be going to the Eurovision semi-final in Oslo on May 27 and hope to make it through to the big final on May 29."

Professional musician Mr Lilygreen is hoping that all his friends and family in Newport will get behind the song and vote for it.

His father Steve Lilygreen is an IT supervisor for Newport council, and his mother Jackie Roberts, brother Marc Lilygreen and sister Sophie Helm all live in the city.

Yesterday, proud grandfather John Lilygreen, 78, from Bettws, told the Argus: "I watched it on the computer and he was just brilliant."

Mr Lilygreen is down-to-earth about his big break.

"I'll be singing for Cyprus with all my heart and I hope everyone here gets behind us," he said.

"But I'll also be happy still playing gigs for the John Oliver band and appearing at places like the Kama Lounge."

Singer has 'natural ability' - lecturer

TONY WILSON taught Jon Lilygreen his first and national music diploma at Coleg Gwent’s Cross Keys campus between 2006 and 2009, and said he showed a natural ability, writes DAVID DEANS.

"He was a fabulous student, an excellent vocalist and a very, very good guitarist," said the lecturer. "While it’s a shock he’s doing something in Cyprus, it’s not a shock that he’s doing something."

Mr Wilson said the performer was a hit in the classroom as well as on stage. "He was really popular on the course and was always the life and soul of the party," he said.

The former student has stayed in touch with the college, the lecturer added, while staff have also followed his path through the Cypriot heats.

Nerys Davies, assistant head teacher at the now Newport High School, said Mr Lilygreen was a regular in school plays and concerts.

"All the students and staff are behind him," she said.

EDITORIAL COMMENT: Round of applause

OUR story today on the Newport man who will represent Cyprus in this year’s Eurovision Song Contest will certainly raise a smile.

Eurovision has long ceased to be a credible vehicle for music, if it ever was in the first place.

In recent years it has become more of a political battle, and now has more attention on that than the music itself.

But you can’t fault former Bettws High School and Coleg Gwent student John Lilygreen for his initiative.

He seized an opportunity – in the most bizarre of circumstances – and will now go from performing in clubs in front of 50 people to a global audience of many millions when he will be seen on TV later in the year.

He’s already fought off plenty of competition to earn his place there.

We wish him every success and hope our Gwent boy does us proud at the contest – even if he is representing another country.