Sabrina who was a famous Greek singer, mostly in 90s and 00s, gave an exclusive interview today on Open TV. Among the other things she was asked was about her attempt to represent Greece at Eurovision 2003. Read more
ERT’s Eurovision 2020 Working Group announced! The five-member committee, headed by Dimitris Papadimitriou for a second consecutive year, has been tasked with delivering an opinion / proposal to the company’s board of directors for the artist who will represent Greece in May in Rotterdam!
The decision signed by the company’s CEO, Mr. Gabritsos Georgios, was announced at today’s meeting of ERT’s management with the reporters of the television reporting, consisting of:
1. PAPADIMITRIOU Dimitris – Composer, Member of the Board of Directors of ERT SA (Chairman)
2. ADAM Petros – Music Producer (Member)
3. MARKAKIS George – Journalist (Member)
4. PETRIDIS Giannis – Music Producer (Member).
5. KOUFOPOULOU Maria – ERT SA International Relations Manager (Member)
It is worth noting that ERT is moving much faster than last year, since the corresponding committee for Eurovision 2019 was set up on 10 January! This announcement also fully confirms the EurovisionFun report on the non-completion of a national final in 2020.
According to the announcements, ERT wants to choose its participation before the holidays so that it has the right time to prepare as best as possible, with the aim of returning Greece to the top ten. The selection for 2020 will also be made by direct assignment.
New administration of ERT presented today its plans and “vision” to reporters covering television reporting. The main purpose of the next television season is to win the television bet, even after many years of betting on entertainment. Of course, the presentation could not miss the reference to Eurovision, which remains the strongest paper on Greek public broadcaster.
The ERT administration has committed to prepare a program (in the full sense of the word, as we refer to television and radio stations) that will have content that will appeal to the majority of the television audience.
The evidence presented by ERT CEO George Gabritsos in his speech is many, interesting and ambitious we would say! But what has been said many times is that ERT intends to become an extrovert, which means that it will give its viewers more attention. The main objective of ERT is to increase the viewership.
So for the next season, in 2020-21, ERT will have a full schedule focusing on entertainment. So ERT1 will be a channel that will not only have information but also entertainment. It is no coincidence that series (such as the one that will bring Victoria Hyslop’s signature) are on the air next season, and new releases.
For the current season, as the CEO said, few new productions were planned by the previous administration. A sample is expected to be received in the coming days, as we have informed you, and what mechanism will be used by ERT to choose our participation in the upcoming Eurovision Contest. The days that for some people in ERT, the competition was faced with disgust and disgust, have gone irreversibly and hold on to what we are told, the new administration has taken it very patriotic and wants nothing more than to bring Greece back to the top 10 in the standings. So it may be late, as some say in the official announcements … but many are already being prepared!
So with our wish, ERT will win the position it deserves among viewers and society!
The announcement of the ERT working group was widely expected this week, following reports that confirmed it. In the end, this has not happened and will not be done until at least the final details of the procedure to be followed by ERT for the selection of the greek representative at Eurovision 2020 will be settled.
The committee may not have been announced, but that does not mean that ERT is not preparing for its next involvement. It has already held a number of formal and informal meetings over the past period and appears to have come up with the procedure to choose this year’s representative.
An open national final is not going to take place as we have written for months, since neither the time nor the ability to organize something worthwhile would have been possible. What qualifies is an internal choice. Indeed, it is very likely that there will be some kind of open invitation to interested artists and creators. The working group, which this year will be a 6-member group, in which the composer Dimitris Papadimitriou will again participate, will be invited to propose to the Board of Directors the best of the proposals. Then the Board of Directors. whether or not to approve the proposal of the working group.
The working group will be announced in the coming days (with no announcement coming next week), after all the details of the selection process have been settled and decided. In addition, these days the head of the Greek Delegation and International Relations Manager, Maria Koufopoulou, is in Geneva, in the General Assembly of the EBU.
Anyone in a hurry should think that the relevant announcement last year was made on 10 January. The intention of the new ERT administration is to do everything possible for Greece to be at the top 10 of the Eurovision 2020 rankings and we do not hide that we are optimistic that it will do so!
For another year, ERT,the greek public broadcaster confirms how cumbersome the Greek bureaucracy is. Although, as you read in our previous articles, three meetings have already taken place in the broadcaster’s HQ, white smoke does not yet exist.
ERT is still trapped in procedures and committees. Neither the art committee that proposes to ERT the way, but perhaps the artist who will represent us in Rotterdam, have been announced, nor have discussions with any artist been significantly advanced.
Stefania mentioned a few days ago on a greek private tv channel,SKAI,is indeed a possibility, but it is possible that they will end up in another person as ERT is heading in other directions as well … Dimitris Papadimitriou will also play an important role in the selection of the artist this year, and as we have told you in the past, the new management of Greek Public Television has turned away from professionals who have had a lot of success in their assets, but in this case as well come to some agreement with them.
What we hope for is that ERT has realized exactly what a competition like Eurovision requires and any experiments will finally stop. Fortunately or unfortunately, Eurovision has been fully commercialized in recent years and the level of the competition has risen sharply. It may take examples from RIK, which for another year with a specific plan, sends an artist who fits into the style of contest, claiming the best result for 2020.
The experiments of recent years have not yielded any positive results and if Greece want to succeed after seven years on the left side of the table, it must “fight” with the same weapons, leaving the tip ideas and stereotypes. In addition, the new administration should, at its option, signal the change of page that it announces that it brought to ERT!
So waiting, with fewer meetings and more actions!
ERT held its third meeting on planning how to choose Greek participation in Eurovision 2020 yesterday (21/10).
The meeting was attended by the new administration, as well as the new program directors and, of course, ERT International Relations Manager, Ms. Maria Koufopoulou. Greek public broadcaster has received suggestions on how Eurovision 2020 will be handled by people outside ERT, who have experience and positive results in the contest.
In the near future, ERT will announce a committee, which will undertake to propose to the Board of Directors how to select the next greek delegation. That was the basic decision of the last meeting.
As we stated in our previous articles, the possibility of an open national final (with free entry) seems to have been definitely ruled out. Whether an artist will be nominated, such as this year with Katerina Duska or a small number (no more than 3-4), will be demonstrated along the way, based on the suggestions put forward by the committee.
ERT begins its journey to Rotterdam with dreams and optimism, for something better than it did this year in Tel Aviv with “Better Love”. Stay tuned for all the details!
The new greek public broadcaster’s administration does not seem to be waiting the new year to begin the process of selecting Greece’s entry in Eurovision 2020, something that ERT used to do in previous years, having already held its second meeting on this purpose.
The second substantive meeting was held on Thursday,October 17th at ERT’s headquarters aiming at elaborating its strategy regarding Eurovision 2020, as well as the Greek presence there.
An indication of the interest given by the new administration to the Eurovision project is that the meeting was attended by the Managing Director, members of the Board, the Director of International Relations of ERT and others.
According to our exclusive information, the possibility of a national final with various artists at this time seems to be completely eliminated. As we mentioned in our previous article, ERT focuses on direct assigning and then finding the song via open call, but of course the direct selection of the song is also ruled out if something very good is found.
ERT’s goal is to gain a place in the top ten, which will put the country back in the game dynamically and as such they are geared towards finding partners with experience and proven positive results in the contest.
However, ERT also wants to exploit the contest commercially in its program on television, as this program is one of the few that have such a large audience.
Ms Maria Koufopoulou, ERT’s Director of International Relations, told us in a conversation that the discussions were moving forward and ERT is already preparing for its participation in Rotterdam.
In the coming days, however, there will be a new meeting at ERT and perhaps then we will have the first major developments as regards the artist who will represent Greece at the 65th Eurovision Song Contest.
Stay tuned for all the exclusive details on this issue!
ERT has already begun planning the method for choosing its entry in Eurovision 2020. Last week, the Greek broadcaster had the first discussion for the matter. A final decision has yet to be made on how the next Greek representative will be selected, although the official announcements will not be late. Read more
As we have already informed you in our previous article, ERT’s committe responsible for the Eurovision project 2019 had their first meeting on Monday, with the first potential artists written down on the list.
Today, EurovisionFun is in a position to confirm that ERT, through Dimitris Papadimitriou, the chairman of the committee, has sent an official proposal to (at least) an artist to wave the Greek flag in the upcoming contest.
As we already told, the committee discussed the first potential artists which would then be approached for the representation of Greece at Eurovision 2019. One of them was Marietta Fafouti (you can read more here).
The intentions of the ERT committee are clear and the chosen artist is to be something different and unique.
ERT, without losing time, has already made at least one formal proposal to an artist to represent us in the competition, as we are able to confirm.
Dimitris Papadimitriou himself contacted Margarita Matsa, managing director of MINOS EMI, to propose to Katerine Duska to represent Greece at Eurovision 2019.
Proposing to Katerine Duska though, doesn’t let Marietta Fafouti out of race. The proposal, as far as we know, states that, unlike the two previous years where ERT only covered the EBU’s participation fee and all the other expenses (airline, hotels, cost of stage performance, etc.) were covered by the artist’s music label or were coming from sponsors , this time the Greek public television will have to pay for it (something to be done since 2016).
Even if ERT’s collaboration with Katerine Duska does not work, the Greek public television and Dimitris Papadimitriou are interested in the artists who serve this kind of music.
Katerine Duska was born in French-speaking Montreal, Canada. She studied classical guitar and classical music. She moved to Greece with her parents during her teenage years, while she has studied Law at the Kapodistrian University of Athens.
Her first album is called “Embodiment“, and has a single called One In A Million.
Would you like to see Katerine representing Greece at the forthcoming Eurovision? Stay tuned in EurovisionFun for all the information regarding the Greek participation in Eurovision 2019.
For the very first time, ERT’s team responsible for the Eurovision project had a meeting earlier today, with the first proposed artists wirtten down on the list.
As we have previously mentioned, ERT is planning to choose the artist through internal selection.
The name that is on top of the list is no other than the 38-year-old Marietta Fafouti. Marietta is a well known artist in recent years in Greece and has signed songs for many of her colleagues, advertising campaigns, television and theater.
She has been honored with many music awards, while her song Kookoobadi, with over 1 million views on YouTube, was awarded as the best song for 2012 by Athens Voice.
Marietta’s name was around the Eurovision media since 2016, inasmuch as she was amongst the artists ERT approached before announcing ARGO as the representatives of Greece.
Marietta Fafouti belongs to the music label of Feelgood Records. Even though Marietta is the first artist ERT will approach, there were other artists proposed by the team. Beside the artists, the team proposed a very well-known virtuoso female composer – we will not reveal her name at this stage.
Stay tuned to EurovisionFun for more information about the Greek representative in the forthcoming Eurovision Song Contest.
Source/Image: EurovisionFun/Alexandros Katsis
