Spain: The jury for the national selection has been revealed!
Spain’s broadcaster, RTVE, announced a while ago the jury for Benidorm Fest, the country’s national final for Eurovision 2023.
The committee consists of:
- Nina (Spanish singer, representative of Spain in 1989)
- Christer Bjorkman (Swedish singer and producer, former head of Melodifestivalen)
- Tali Eshkoli (Israeli television producer and Israel’s HoD)
- Nicola Caligiore (Italian, former HoD of Italy)
- Katrina Leskanich (American singer, UK representative in 1997)
- William Lee Adams (founder of wiwibloggs)
- Irene Valiente (Spanish presenter and producer)
- Juan Jose Santana (Spanish, president of OGAE Spain and composer of past Spanish entries)
Benidorm Fest 2023:
18 artists will participate in two Semi-Finals, which will take place on January 31st and February 2nd. Four songs from each semi-final will advance to the final. The Grand Final on February 4 will feature the eight finalists. The winner of Benidorm Fest will be Spain’s representative at the 67th European competition, which will be held in Liverpool next May.
The result will be decided through a mixed voting system between the jury and the public vote which will include televoting and poll jury.
50% of the score will correspond to the jury
The remaining 50% will be made up of the public vote (where 25% by televoting and the remaining 25% by a polling jury).
Additional information
The communications director of RTVE announced that throughout the week of the festival there will be daily related events throughout the city, as well as concerts with artists from the previous event as well as several who did not manage to be in the final selection this year.
Also, on Friday, February 3, from 9 to 12 at night, the Euroclub will be opened where, among others, last year’s representatives of Albania and Romania, Ronela Hajati and WRS, will be present.
As if all this were not enough, during this week the “tapafest” will also take place, the purpose of which according to the organizers is to promote Spanish gastronomy, as 28 locals will compete in cooking and visitors to the city will be able to “not only to try this very Spanish dish, but also to choose the best one”.
Source: RTVE
Stay tuned to Eurovisionfun for all the developments regarding Spain’s participation in Eurovision 2023, in Liverpool!
The latest version of this year’s rules indicates that the jury could select up to six substitutes. For the 2022 Benidorm Fest, the jury chose 14 participants and six substitutes. If this year the same system had been repeated, ‘Aire’ by Sharonne and ‘Quiero arder’ by Agoney could also have been left out, which were the fifteenth and sixteenth most valued proposals, respectively.
Citi Zēni – “Eat Your Salad” – Latvia 2022 
Efendi – “Mata Hari” – Azerbaijan 2021
Blind Channel – “Dark Side” – Finland 2021
Helena Paparizou – “My Number One” – Greece 2005
Mor ve Ötesi – “Deli” – Turkey 2008
Marija Šerifović – “Molitva”– Serbia 2007
Lena – “Satellite” – Germany 2010
Måns Zelmerlöw – “Heroes”– Sweden 2015
Sunstroke Project & Olia Tira – “Run Away” – Moldova 2010
Mahmood – “Soldi” – Italy 2019
Jérémie Makiese – “Miss You” – Belgium 2022 
Ruslana – “Wild Dances” – Ukraine 2004
Sergey Lazarev – “You Are The Only One” – Russia 2016
MARO – “saudade, saudade” – Portugal 2022
Barbara Pravi – “Voilà” – France 2021
Ochman – “River” – Poland 2022
Eleni Foureira – “Fuego” – Cyprus 2018
Duncan Laurence – “Arcade” – Netherlands 2019
LUM!X feat. Pia Maria – “Halo” – Austria 2022
Ronela Hajati –“Sekret” – Albania 2022
Netta – “TOY” – Israel 2018
Rosa Linn – “Snap” – Armenia 2022
WRS – ”Llámame” – Ρουμανία 2022
Alexander Rybak – ”Fairytale” – Νορβηγία 2009
Sam Ryder – ”SPACE MAN” – Ηνωμένο Βασίλειο 2022
Chanel – ”SloMo” – Ισπανία 2022
Kazakhstan: David Charlin – Jer-Ana (Mother Earth)
Malta: Gaia Gambuzza – Diamonds In The Skies
Georgia: Mariam Bigvava – I Believe
Ireland: Sophie Lennon – Solas
North Macedonia: Lara feat. Jovan & Irina – Životot E Pred Mene
