POP SUPERPOWER?
Trying to play this down is like telling a football fanatic to relax because it's only a game.
This year, as a result of a long-awaited victory in the 2008 competition, Russia will host the Eurovision song contest in May.
The selection of the song has started a scandal.
Before I explain why, it is important to point out that in Russia many people take the contest much more seriously than they do in Western Europe.
Russia's main TV evening news ran a report the other day in which it praised the staging of the final as sign that "after decades of isolation, our country is finally returning to Europe and reclaiming the status of a superpower in politics and culture, including popular music, that rightfully belongs to it".
Of course, that superpower status has been much discussed over the last 12 months: usually in the context of Russia's relations with its neighbours.
The singer who will perform Russia's entry, Anastasia Prikhodko, is Ukrainian - and that's not the only potentially sensitive political issue.
FRIENDSHIP OF THE PEOPLES
"For me this is an enormous joy," Anastasia Prikhodko's Georgian producer Konstantin Meladze told the RIA-Novosti news agency.
"I'm in favour of the friendship of Russians, Ukrainians, Georgians and all others. In principle, this is a very international song, because the music was written by a Georgian, a Ukranian sang it, and half the text was written by an Estonian."
That is why there is a scandal.
In the last 12 months, Russia has had a gas war with Ukraine, and a real war with Georgia. Two years ago, it had a bitter row with Estonia when that country moved a Soviet-era war memorial.
It would be hard to pick three former Soviet republics that have worse relations with their one-time masters in Moscow.
The producer of one of the rival acts in the contest to represent Russia has exploded in patriotic outrage.
"Let's get Ukrainian footballers to represent the Russian national team at the European football championships - Dynamo Kiev, for example, and a coach from Georgia," Iosif Prigozhin told Ekho Moskvy radio. "It is all a bluff. It is all a farce."
Some of the Moscow rush hour crowds seemed to agree.
"It's not right that Russia will be represented with a song in the Ukrainian language. It's just not right," said Anna.
"Yes, it's no good - after all, the Russian language is mighty and much nicer than Ukrainian," agreed her friend.
Some may see in Russia's multilingual, multinational effort an attempt to recreate a communist-era idea of "friendship of the peoples".
Others sense a sophisticated scheme to draw the sting from any organised anti-Russian voting.
There are echoes of war and post-Soviet strife in Georgia's entry too.
Eurovision organisers have told Georgia's representatives to alter a song which seems to mock Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin - but they've decided to pull out instead.
So, with two months to go, this is already promising to be a most memorable event.
If Russia and its neighbours really want to "return to Europe", they should start to see the song contest a little less as a battleground for global ambition, and a little more as entertainment.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7937811.stm