Today is the day we finally reach May – Eurovision month! It’s been a long time coming, but the contest is finally within our sights, and as with last year, the EBU has marked the start of the month by releasing some information to the fans – the names of this year’s jury members.
On the official Eurovision website, you can take a look at the provisional list of the 200 (240 if you include back-up members, but really only 238 because two are still missing) people who will have a 50% stake in the qualifiers, the winner, and the losers of this year’s contest.
Much criticism has been aimed at the juries and the jury system in recent years, but for 2015 at least the system will remain the same, with 5 jury members in each country ranking each song other than their own before combining these to give an overall jury ranking, which is then combined with the country’s televote. The EBU does however take steps to ensure fairness and transparency, such as having an independent notary present with the juries, not allowing anyone who has sat on a jury for the last two years to sit on one this year, and of course by giving the fans the opportunity to flag up any unfair balances or jury members who perhaps shouldn’t be there by releasing the names in advance.
Several former Eurovision participants are on the juries, such as last year’s contenders Aram MP3 from Armenia, Ruth Lorenzo from Spain and Cleo from Poland. Also, 1977 winner Marie Myriam is on the French jury, whilst other familiar faces include Ryan Dolan (Ireland, 2013), Alsou (Russia, 2010) and Margaret Berger (Norway, 2013). The youngest jury member is 17 year-old Isa, who participated in this year’s Melodifestivalen and sits on the Swedish jury, and the oldest is Slovenia’s back-up jury member Dušan Hren, aged 86, who was the first ever head of delegation for Yugoslavia at Eurovision, way back in 1961!
For more information, facts and figures, as well as to peruse the full list for yourselves, take a look at this page on eurovision.tv, the official website for the contest.
81