Faroe Islands: Five year support to KVF is needed for its integration in the EBU!

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As we’ve previously informed you, the public broadcaster of the Faroe Islands, which is called KVF, hopes to become a member of the EBU, in the near future.

For yet another year, an artist from the Faroe Islands, took part in the DMGP 2024 ending up in third place. That is Janus Wiberg with the song “I Need Your Love”.

The public broadcaster of the Faroe Islands, has expressed its interest in competing in the Eurovision Song Contest, but taking into account that the Islands are part of the Danish Realm, the complete EBU member status, is not yet been approved.

Sirið Stenberg, the Minister of Social Affairs and Culture, was iin Liverpool last year alongside Ivan Niclasen. In this way, the public broadcaster, decided that the Faroe Islands must be a part of the EBU, and represent the Faroeses in Eurovision.

A five year support to KVF is essential, for its integration into the EBU. The EBU is responsible for Eurovision and it’s a partnership between public broadcasters. Becoming a member of the EBU will cost 1.5 million ISK, adding to the half million ISK for its annual membership.

However, all these plans are still in the making…

Stay tuned on Eurovisionfun for all the news regarding the Eurovision Song Contest!

Slovenia: RTV SLO to Seek EBU and Council Members’ Opinion on Israel’s Participation in the Contest!

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Following a plea from the Palestinian Rights Movement to the management of Slovenia’s public broadcaster, RTV SLO, there’s now a call to exclude Israel from the Eurovision. Specifically, 25 members of the European Parliament requested the cancellation of the decision allowing Israel’s participation in the upcoming contest in May in Malmö.

Several non-governmental and trade union organizations, Slovenian cultural figures, and artists, including some former Slovenian Eurovision representatives, signed the call by the Palestinian Rights Movement.

RTV SLO responded to their request, stating:

“The majority of the global audience is closely following events in Gaza. The EBU has already explained twice that the participants in the Eurovision Song Contest are public broadcasters, not countries.”

However, they added that they would still urge the EBU and its members to conduct a substantive discussion on the matter.

Raiven will represent Slovenia in Malmö this coming May with the song “Veronika,” entirely in Slovenian. She will compete in the second half of the First Semi-Final on May 7th.

Stay tuned to Eurovisionfun for all the developments regarding Slovenia’s participation in the Eurovision 2024 in Malmö!

Source: RTV SLO

Christer Björkman: “We will be effective and we will be able to shorten the show!” | Exclusive Interview

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Andreas Papayiannakis and EurovisionFun was invited along with a limited number of media by SVT, to attend the official hand-over ceremony of the contest hosting, from the City of Liverpool to the City of Malmö and the Eurovision Allocation Draw which was broadcast live on eurovision.tv and Ertflix tonight.

There we had the chance to meet several of the people involved in the production of the contest, the Mayor of the City of Malmö Katrin Stjernfeldt Jammeh, the Program Executive of the City of Malmö Karin Karlsson, Eurovision Executive Producer Ebba Adielsson, and Show Producer Christer Björkman.

Christer Björkman spoke exclusively to us about his comeback and more. Christer has been a show producer for five times, now he’s coming back for the sixth time. But how does it feel to be back? Was he planning on his return? Christer said:

“No, I mean to me it was something that I have left behind me and I felt I was done with it. But then when they called and said, you know, we want you, we need you, it’s very hard to say no to Eurovision. You know that, we all know that, we’re fans, you know, in the back of our bones we’re fans. And I’m very proud to be back.”

SVT has always been a trendsetter throughout the years and now with the help of Christer, they are planning on cutting down on the show for up to one hour this year. Christer clarifies:

“Well, we’re trying to be effective. We set up a goal for ourselves to have a show that is 3.30, which is roughly what it was in Malmo last time. That’s sort of the national ego that makes us do that and having done this in Sweden quite recently, you know, in 2016 and we did 2013, so we don’t have to do all that over and over again. So we will be effective and we will be able to shorten it. Maybe not all the way to 3.30, but not far from it.”

Christer has done so many great shows in the past, so his opinion on competing songs and staging matters a lot. So we asked him what he thinks of the Cypriot entry “Liar” and Silia Kapsis! Christer admitted he has listened to the song of Cyprus and got really enthusiastic about telling us his opinion about it:

“Oh my God, I have. I think it’s a very good song. I have not seen Silia live, so I cannot judge the artist’s ability when it comes to a live performance. But the recording is great and I love the song. And it will definitely be one of the songs that I will be very keen on to work with because I think it can be a really good stage performance as well. So that one is good.”

The last time there has been a comment like this about a Greek or Cypriot entry, was back in 2018 with the participation of Cyprus with Eleni Foureira and the song “Fuego“.

You can watch our exclusive interview with Christer Björkman at the video down below:

Special thanks to SVT for inviting us and the City of Malmö for the great hosting at this lovely ceremony, but also many many more that are about to come.

Stay tuned at Eurovisionfun and don’t miss out on anything regarding our most loved contest!

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Christer Björkman: “I’m here to make the greatest TV show in the world, SVT can answer on Israel’s participation!”

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On Monday, more than 1.000 Swedish artists, sent a petition to the EBU and the public broadcaster of Sweden, SVT, in order to ask for Israel’s exclusion from Eurovision, as we’ve previously informed you.

Read more

Eurovision 2024: The Semi-Final Allocation Draw Results!

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Malmö with a very nice event hosted a few minutes ago the draw for the semi-finals of the 68th Eurovision Song Contest.

The analyzes of the fans and not only, have been on fire for a few minutes now. Since the theories based on the pre-history of the countries in the competition, it is a first insight into how passable the qualification to the final is or not. In other words, it’s time to make our predictions, about who will go through to the final and who are the favorites to say goodbye to Malmö early…

The presenters and the handover ceremony

Presenters of the Eurovision 2024 semi-final draw were Pernilla Månsson Colt and Farah Abadi. It is worth mentioning that Pernilla Månsson Colt was also the presenter of the corresponding draw in 2013, eleven years ago when Malmö hosted the Eurovision Song Contest for the last time. Both of them are part of the SVT staff, being some of the most beloved faces of the Swedish state broadcaster.

During the draw, the ceremony of handing over and accepting the emblem of the contest took place. The mayor of Liverpool, Steven Rotheram, formally handed over the “keys to the event” to the mayor of Malmö, Katrin Stjernfeldt Jammeh.

Draw Procedure

Big 5 and Sweden

With the big winner of last year’s competition, Sweden, directly in the final, along with the Big 5 (UK, France, Italy, Germany, Spain), the first part of the draw determined the semi-final that the direct finalists would vote for.

Will vote in the 1st Semi-Final:

  • Sweden
  • United Kingdom
  • Germany

Will vote in the 2nd Semi-Final:

  • Spain
  • Italy
  • France

In the semi-final that the six aforementioned countries were drawn to broadcast and vote for, the video from their dress rehearsal will also be shown. This was done at Eurovision 2016 for the first time, for reasons of equal exposure of the countries directly in the final and the countries that qualify from the semi-finals. Essentially, viewers see each entry twice during the shows.

Semi-Final Allocation Draw

The allocation draw for the two semi-finals had two parts. In the first part the 31 countries participating in the semi-finals were drawn in which of the two they will compete in. Fifteen countries will compete in the first semi-final and sixteen in the second semi-final.

In the second part, each country learned whether it will appear in the first or second half of the semi-final in which it will compete. The exact order of appearance will be determined by the EBU and the show’s producers at a later date.

1st Semi-final (May 7):

1st Half

  • Ukraine
  • Cyprus
  • Poland
  • Serbia
  • Lithuania
  • Croatia
  • Ireland

2nd Half

  • Slovenia
  • Iceland
  • Finland
  • Portugal
  • Luxembourg
  • Australia
  • Azerbaijan
  • Moldova

2nd Semi-Final (May 9):

1st Half

  • Austria
  • Malta
  • Switzerland
  • Greece
  • Czechia
  • Albania
  • Denmark
  • Armenia

2nd Half

  • Israel
  • Estonia
  • Georgia
  • Netherlands
  • Norway
  • Latvia
  • San Marino
  • Belgium

Malmö will host the 68th Eurovision Song Contest from 7 to 11 May at the Malmö Arena. The motto of this year’s event, as chosen by the organisers, is “United by Music“, retaining the motto first chosen for last year’s contest in Liverpool.

You can see the draw again through the link below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_-2hMEq5sk

Stay tuned to Eurovisionfun for all the developments regarding Eurovision 2024!

 

Eurovision 2024: Tonight the Allocation Draw!

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At 19:00 CET and live from Malmö, Sweden, the draw for the Eurovision 2024 semi-finals will take place tonight.

During today’s event, there will also be a handover of the event’s banner from the city of Liverpool to the city of Malmö. For this reason, both the Mayor of Liverpool, Steven Rotheram, and the Mayor of the Swedish city, Katrin Stjernfeldt Jammeh, will be present at today’s draw.

The hosts

The hosts of tonight’s draw for the semi-finals of the 68th Eurovision Song Contest will be Pernilla Månsson Colt and Farah Abadi. It is worth mentioning that Pernilla Månsson Colt was the presenter of the equivalent draw in 2013, eleven years ago when Malmö hosted the Eurovision Song Contest for the last time.

The draw procedure

The first part of the draw will determine which semi-final will be broadcast and voted for by each of the six countries that are directly in the final on 11 May (Sweden, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, and the United Kingdom).

The second part of the draw will determine which semi-final and which half the other 31 participating countries will compete in. As in recent years, the exact order of appearance will be determined by the event producers at a later date.

The 31 countries have been divided into five pots, based on historical voting patterns as calculated by Eurovision’s official voting partner, Digame.

Drawing countries from different pots aims to reduce the likelihood of so-called neighbour voting and increases the suspense in the semi-finals.

Pots

Pot 1
  • 🇦🇱 Albania
  • 🇦🇹 Austria
  • 🇨🇭 Switzerland
  • 🇭🇷 Croatia
  • 🇷🇸 Serbia
  • 🇸🇮 Slovenia
Pot 2
  • 🇦🇺 Australia
  • 🇩🇰 Denmark
  • 🇪🇪 Estonia
  • 🇫🇮 Finland
  • 🇮🇸 Iceland
  • 🇳🇴 Norway
Pot 3
  • 🇦🇲 Armenia
  • 🇦🇿 Azerbaijan
  • 🇬🇪 Georgia
  • 🇮🇱 Israel
  • 🇱🇻 Latvia
  • 🇱🇹 Lithuania
  • 🇺🇦 Ukraine
Pot 4
  • 🇨🇾 Cyprus
  • 🇬🇷 Greece
  • 🇮🇪 Ireland
  • 🇲🇹 Malta
  • 🇵🇹 Portugal
  • 🇸🇲 San Marino
Pot 5
  • 🇧🇪 Belgium
  • 🇨🇿 Czechia
  • 🇱🇺 Luxembourg
  • 🇳🇱 Netherlands
  • 🇲🇩 Moldova
  • 🇵🇱 Poland

https://twitter.com/Eurovision/status/1751972070479565001

So in the evening, we all tune in for the draw of the semi-finals of our favourite contest. You can watch the draw on the official Eurovision channel on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_-2hMEq5sk

Stay tuned to Eurovisionfun for all the developments regarding Eurovision 2024!

EBU: The union’s take on Auto-Tune! | There is an exception to the rule!

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While the EBU requires Eurovision participants to sing live with their raw vocals at the song contest, NRK has allowed so-called Auto-Tune in the Norwegian Melodi Grand Prix. The Eurovision organizer had always been cautious about commenting on the topic, but now clearly outlines the rules for Auto-Tune to TV 2. EBU‘s communications department outlines:

“Live vocals are very important in our format and in the tradition of the competition. The quality of the main vocals is a large part of the overall assessment of the performance, both for the jury and the audience at home. That performance should happen live, and without manipulation.”

Auto-Tune is a digital music tool that corrects the pitch of the voice, even in real-time, so singers always hit the tone precisely. The technology became particularly famous in 1998 through the song “Believe” by Cher.

This is the exception

Despite the seemingly categorical ban, the EBU acknowledges that there does not exist a total Auto-Tune ban on the Eurovision stage.

“Auto-Tune can be used as a sound effect on parts of a song, but we don’t allow it to correct the tone of the lead singer or backing vocals throughout the song.”

This means that the controversial technology can be used in a registered song, but no more extensive form than as an effect grip. President Morten Thomassen of the Norwegian Eurovision club says about the new information:

“I think it is the first time they clarify these rules so much. It’s good that they’re still against Auto-Tune on paper, but the way I interpret the rules, it can be applied to the vocally difficult parts of the song and that’s probably where it’s needed most I would think.”

“Unfortunately, Auto-Tune is here to stay”

Thomassen is not satisfied with the fact that Auto-Tune is freely allowed in the NRK competition of MGP, which is the stage where Norway‘s Eurovision entry is to be selected from, expressing his clear dissatisfaction when he spoke to TV 2 on Tuesday.

He thought Auto-Tune in a contest like Eurovision is like “putting too much makeup on the bride”, and already last year asked NRK to reverse the choice of the sometimes reviled technology.

Do you agree with the use of Auto-Tune at the Eurovision Song Contest? Let us know in the comments section below!

Stay tuned at EurovisionFun for all the latest news regarding the Eurovision Song Contest!

Source: TV 2

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Greece: ERT answers to fans who demand Israel’s exclusion from Eurovision!

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A few days ago, an introductory video was published in the Contest’s social media, in which the Greek representative, Marina Satti, introduces herself to the fans of Eurovision.

Marina Satti introduced herself to “the people of Eurovision” and she states that she can’t wait to go to Malmö in Sweden in May, in order to present the Greek music, culture, dances and energy, and she wishes to see everyone there!

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Eurovision Song Contest (@eurovision)

However in the comment section of the video, as well as in many recent posts in Eurovision’s social media, there are many comments that disapprove Israel’s participation in this year’s contest. In the same time, they ask Marina Satti and ERT, the Greek broadcaster, to demand Israel’s exclusion, and in case this doesn’t happen they want Greece itself, to withdraw from the contest.

Greece is not the only country to receive this kind of messages. The public broadcasters of Iceland, Ireland as well as that of Finland, have all received a great amount of messages, demanding each country’s withdrawal from the contest, in case Israel competes.

According to news247.gr, ERT answered to all these accusations, saying that the topic of a possible Greek withdrawal from the Eurovision Song Contest 2024, has not been present in any conversation in the channel!

In detail, Dora Chiraki the Director of Corporate Communication of ERT, stated:

“As of now, no official request have been made on Israel’s exclusion by EBU, by any of the competing countries, as was the case with Russia, for example. There is nothing official. If there is something in the future, then we will discuss it.”

Do you think that Greece will withdraw from Eurovision 2024? Write us in the comments below!

 Stay tuned on Eurovisionfun for all the news regarding the Greek participation at the Eurovision Song Contest 2024, in Malmö!

Source: news247.gr

Eurovision 2024: First look at next year’s stage!

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SVT, host broadcaster for the 68th Eurovision Song Contest, has unveiled the impressive stage our 37 artists will be performing on in Malmö next May.

https://twitter.com/Eurovision/status/1737103178682761461?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet

Movable LED cubes, LED floors, light, video and stage technology will combine to create some spectacular variations in the arena, while the stage is placed right in the middle of the audience, shaped like a cross, creating a unique 360-degree experience that the audience and viewers will get to experience in May.

The names behind the concept are Florian Wieder, Production Designer, and Fredrik Stormby, Light and Screen Content Designer.

According to the Executive Producer, Ebba Adielsson:

It is with great pride that we present our vision of the stage and lighting design for the Eurovision Song Contest 2024. We have not seen anything like this before at Eurovision and the concept gives us endless opportunities to create unique spaces and expressions for both the competing artists and the opening and interval acts. Florian and Fredrik’s creation is simply fantastic and it will be so much fun to see the end result!

One of the stage creators, Fredrik Stormby adds:

We believe that together we have created what is an unexpected and updated concept for the Eurovision Song Contest 2024 and are looking forward to showing it off for real! I am honoured to have been commissioned to design the light and video in collaboration with the team from our studio, and the production team that SVT has put into place for the project. 

We’ve developed a strong concept together, and I’m really looking forward to the continued collaboration in production, the creative process with the delegations, and eventually getting my teeth into the show and doing the broadcasts!

The Eurovision 2024 stage is unique. It is the first time that the stage is placed centrally, while the audience surrounds it. Moreover, there will be an installation of video and light, centered above the stage, where the lighting design has been crafted to truly embrace the artists and their performances, hence there will be led screens everywhere.

The Eurovision Song Contest 2024 is organized in collaboration with the city of Malmö and will be broadcast from Malmö Arena on Tuesday 7 May (semi-final 1), Thursday 9 May (semi-final 2) and Saturday 11 May (final) after Loreen won for a second time in Liverpool with the song “Tattoo“.

Stay tuned at EurovisionFun for all the latest news regarding the Eurovision Song Contest!

Source: eurovision.tv

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Romania: TVR received extra time from the EBU to pay the participation fee!

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The EBU published then list of participating countries, taking part in Eurovision 2024 and even though Romania was abscent, it was mentioned that discussions are still underway, regarding their participation. More information was given away earlier today, on what really happened on Romania’s participation, and if that is possible. Read more