Eurovision Rants

National Selections

(Oh god, alright, 11 reads already, thank you all *O*
So this page is entirely dedicated to national selections and what are they, more precisely. And yes, this book already started being messy, but oh well.)
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Still a baby duckling around Eurovision and you can't manage to understand how some nations pick their representatives?

Well, don't you worry. We've all been there at some point, so it's alright to know a couple few essential stuff.

So, if you're already super new in this contest and probably non-European (if European, in this case, maybe some people might catch it on TV, at least their country's national selection), there's a thing you might have to know.

Eurovision participating nations have 2 options to pick their acts or representatives: through internal act or through national selection.

Internal acts are pretty much what it implies: the respective broadcaster picks an artist or a group (of course, the ones which are interested can contact the broadcaster themselves or the broadcaster can approach an artist for that) and the team works for the song/performance.

Usually, countries often opt for an internal selection due to financial reasons, ones which neither the broadcaster themselves can't cover, but some just don't do it because some of their artists express a lot of interest for the contest (like our new joined Australia)

A national selection, however, it's quite the opposite. The broadcaster plans the selection before, and open submissions so that the artists can apply.

Now, a national selection can differ in size. Some nations prefer to do a smaller NS (usually ranged between 5-12 songs in a big Grand Final and all) or a larger NS (where in this case, it can include semi-finals or even a second chance round in Sweden's case).

When you're an avid Eurovision fan, even the national selections count. After the date where the submissions are open (it's usually open somwhere in the beggining  or middle of September), every song under 3 minutes can be considered as a potential candidate for Eurovision.

Also, the national selection period of time is one opportunity to see and listen to new songs, artists or even different music genres. It's kind-of like the "Battle Royale" of the respective country. Only one ends up as a winner.
Of course, there's also the rather more known "Super Saturdays", of which multiple countries establish their semi-finals or finals on a Saturday (how ironic?) and you as an europal, is either watching one on computer, either using telephone, tablet or even different open tabs just so you'd watch them all at the same time.

Trust us, the life of an europal isn't the easiest in the world. But there's moments which made it totally worth it.

Probably the most notorious national selection is Sweden's Melodifestivalen. It's probably the most viewed by europals and among the larger national selections. It has 4 semi-finals, of which 2 are qualifying into the finals and 2 are qualifying for the second chance round.
The second chance round songs are then paired 2 by 2, of which only one can pass through. In the end, the grand final decides the winner, which is chosen with the help of jury and televote.

Personally, I'm not too fond of Melodifestivalen. And I don't think I've ever been, in fact. However, I do think they deliver some good songs in there (such as the song mentioned earlier in the very beginning of the page, the video up there), but they end up either too close to win, either don't make it at all.

If you want more national selections, just keep up with the Eurovision-related websites or simply with the Eurovision channel in itself. Tumblr, Facebook & Instagram can offer you plenty of sources, including links towards the broadcaster's live, or even the Youtube live shows.

The entire national selection period usually begins around end of December/beginning of January and it ends in the beggining of March. February is pretty much flooded with them, and usually there are the most prevalent "Super Saturdays".

~Kebab