RTP received over 200 songs for Festival da Canção 2019

The open call for songs to compete in Festival da Canção 2019 has reached its deadline. According to RTP, they have received over 200 songs. To judge these songs, RTP will form a jury for this purpose. Personalities with “recognised merit” in the field of music and television and music production will be part of the jury. Out of these attempts, they will choose one song to compete in Festival da Canção 2019. 

Festival da Canção 2019

The next edition of the Portuguese national final will have a similar format to the one used in 2018. However, instead of 26 competing songs, only sixteen songs will compete in Festival da Canção 2019. RTP will select the other songs through the same method:

• RTP invited 14 composers to present an original song;
• They will select the composer in the “Master Class” radio program of Antena 1. The winner will then have to submit a new song for the national final;
• The remaining slot will be selected through an open selection. All Portuguese citizens or residents were able to apply until October 31.

If we look at the number of songs in the open selection, we can see a huge decrease between 2018 and 2019. For Festival da Canção 2018, 346 songs were sent to RTP, while for 2019 the broadcaster has received only 200 songs (approximately). However, the huge number of songs received in 2018 can be explained by the fact that Portugal was hosting Eurovision.

In 2018, the winner of the open selection was Peter Serrado with his song “Sunset”. Despite qualifying from the semi-finals, the song ranked only 11° in the Grand Final, among 14 songs.

Portugal in the Eurovision Song Contest

The Portuguese debut in the competition dates back to 1964. Despite the long history in Eurovision, Portugal only managed to get in the top ten times. Lúcia Moniz and Salvador Sobral were responsible for the two most sucessful Portuguese attempts. Lúcia Moniz ranked sixth in 1996, and Salvador gave the first victory to Portugal. Last year, Claudia Pascoal represented the country with “O jardim”, placing last in the Grand Final. We are looking forward to see what Portugal has to offer in 2019.