JOY Eurovision

13 Oct 2013

The Update: The National Selections, Participants and New Releases

This is The Update – a (semi) regular news post, keeping you up to speed with the happenings of Eurovision 2014 and the doings of past ESC entrants. We look at the latest from some of the National Selections and check out what past entrants have been releasing music-wise.

Europe Starts Selecting

Europe has begun the massive process of selecting their entries for Copenhagen. In this Update, we take a look at a couple of the National Selections that have already started.

Switzerland will make their final decision about their entrant on 1 February after a number of stages organised by the public broadcasters SRF (German-speaking), RTR (Romansh-speaking), RTS (French-speaking) and RSI (Italian-speaking). Artists are currently entering their songs online, with website visitors and a jury deciding on nine songs from SRF and RTR that will go to a second stage. These nine songs will be joined by six from RTS and three from RSI to be judged by a panel assessing vocal quality and stage presence. Six of these eighteen songs will then be chosen to go to the final. Out of the six songs, three will be from SRF and RTR, two from RTS and one from RSI. In the final on 1 February, the six acts will present their own song and a cover of another song, with the final decision made by a 50/50 vote of the public and a jury.

Finland is already sifting through the 420 entries it has received for Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu (UMK) 2014, the annual Finnish Eurovision selection festival. A jury is now in the process of finding a shortlist of 12 songs to be presented to the Finnish public on 4 November. UMK will take place over five heats beginning 28 December, with the final taking place on 1 February. Although the number of entries is less than last year, UMK organisers are happy with the quality of entries received, with many female singers and a mix of old and new composers.

Ins & Outs

Slowly the list of confirmed broadcasters gets bigger and bigger. To date:

Definitely in

Israel, Hungary, Belarus, UK, France and Lithuania are the newest confirmations for 2014. They join Austria, Sweden, Belgium, Germany, Estonia, Switzerland, Iceland, Russia, FYR Macedonia, Denmark, Norway, Ireland, Malta, Georgia, The Netherlands, Albania, Latvia, Montenegro and Spain as confirmed entrants.

Probably in

Serbia has joined Slovenia, Hungary, Moldova, Portugal, Ukraine, Bulgaria and Italy as being likely possibilities to travel to Copenhagen.

Probably out

Turkey is still sitting on the fence, pending their meeting with EBU representatives. Greece’s chances of participating, after former public broadcaster ERT was shut down by the Greek government, are slim. While the EBU wants Greece in the Contest, their new broadcaster NERIT needs to be certified to join the EBU before they can apply to be part of the Eurovision Song Contest.

Definitely out

Cyprus and Czech Republic are the latest casualties of the European economic woes, ruling themselves out of next year’s contest. They join Croatia, Monaco, Morocco, Liechtenstein, Slovakia, Andorra and Luxembourg as being ruled out for 2014.

New Releases

Belgium’s 2013 rep, Roberto Bellarosa, has a brand new single. Suivre mon étoile (which translates to Follow my star) is a different sound to his 2013 entry, with a funky edge for this reality show winner.

The winners of the 2011 Contest, Ell and Nikki, have released a tribute to Michael Jackson. The Azerbaijani duo’s single Music Still Alive was written by the little elf, Ell, with music composed by Isa Melikov.

Malta came second in 2002 with 7th Wonder and the woman behind it has a new album and single for the island nation. Ira Losco has released Me Luv U Long Time from her album Fire.

And last, but not least, Norway’s 2012 entrant goes a bit more electronic than usual. Rebels is the new release for Tooji, which was produced by famous Swedish hit maker, Chris Wahle.