It’s been yet another busy week in the Eurovision world, with three more countries selecting their entires for Rotterdam, and a number of updates for internal selections. Rather than focus on national final songs, we will continue to run down the list of artists with unconfirmed and unreleased songs. We’ll recap the confirmed entries so far at the bottom of the article, and when we’ll get the national final winners too!
With 9 songs confirmed, 41 competing countries and three weeks until the Heads of Delegation meeting on March 9th, things are about to ramp up on the road to Rotterdam! Tonight, we’re due our 10th entry in the form of Tom Leeb’s entry for France.
In this bumper update, we have song a release dates for Belgium’s Hooverphonic and Austria, plus an artist announcement from Romania. We also have revamp details from the Czech Republic, as well as song details from Bulgaria’s VICTORIA, Cyprus’ Sandro and North Macedonia’s Vasil. We also have more details on Israel and Switzerland’s selections.
NOTE: Only confirmed artists will be featured in these updates.
Speaking of confirmed artists, Nathan, Tim, Julian and myself reacted to the internally-selected artists we have so far (excluding Stefania and Roxen):
🇦🇹 Austria: Vincent Bueno – “Alive”
Announced: December 12th
Status: Assumed to be recorded.
Release date: 4 March
Since we got the confirmation of Vincent’s participation, we have heard very little about Austria’s entry. Last year, “Limits” was selected by the broadcaster along with PÆNDA as the artist – a package deal. We can take this as an indication that the song is pretty much there…especially considering the fact that the song title and hints about the song were part of the announcement. This week, we got a release date (March 4th), and some more cryptic words about the song.
🇧🇪 Belgium: Hooverphonic – TBA
Announced: October 1st
Status: Release date confirmed
Release date: 17 February
Being the first act announced, Hooverphonic have had a lot of time to get their entry together. This week, it was confirmed that the song will be released on Monday! The song will premiere on Belgian radio, with the official music video being released later in the day.
🇧🇬 Bulgaria: VICTORIA – TBA
Announced: 25th November
Status: two songs left in the running
Released date: March TBA
This week we also got some more details from the Bulgarian camp regarding VICTORIA’s entry…or entries. VICTORIA has revealed that two songs are still in the race to be selected as Bulgaria’s entry for Rotterdam. In a recent Bulgarian TV interview, VICTORIA said that the two songs were shortlisted from six with the help of a European focus group.
The remaining songs both have different styles – one is more ‘commercial’ and the other is more ’emotional’, with VICTORIA preferring the latter. The Bulgarian team has yet to make the decision between these two songs, but Victoria reveals that the entry will be in English. The selected song will be presented for the public in early March.
🇨🇾 Cyprus: Sandro – “Running”
Announced: November 29th
Status: Song selected
Release date: TBA
CyBC have been revealing details about Sandro’s entry over the last couple of weeks…except for a release date! Last week we learned that Australia Decides 2019 finalist Alfie Alcuri is leading the songwriting team for Cyprus’ entry. It was also announced that the artistic director for Sandro’s performance will be Vienna based Marvin Dietmann, who previously worked as the assistant producer for Eurovision Song Contest in Tel Aviv and Kyiv, stage director in Vienna and Lisbon as well as director for the performances by Conchita Wurst, Zoë and Cesar Sampson.
In addition, we learned later last week that the song in question is called “Running”.
🇨🇿 Czech Republic: Benny Cristó – “Kemama”
Announced: 3 February
Status: Revamp in progress
Release date: Unknown
Earlier this month, Benny Cristo’s “Kemama” became the third confirmed entry for Eurovision 2020. Following his win, Benny confirmed that the song will be undergoing a revamp. Last weekend, he took to Instagram to announce that he will revamp his winning song ‘Kemama’ in Kenya! We don’t know how much the final version will differ from the ESCZ version, nor do we have a release date for the revamp.
🇮🇱 Israel: Eden Alene – TBA
Announced: 13 February
Status: Songs shortlisted
Release date: TBA
Last week, Israel selected Eden Alene to represent them in Rotterdam. Rather than internally-select her entry like past HaKokhav HaBa L’Eurovizion winners, her entry will be selected via a televised final. This week, details of the four shortlisted songs were revealed – including their titles and the teams behind them. Although we don’t know when exactly we will hear them, we know Eden will perform all four on March 3rd.
🇲🇰 North Macedonia: Vasil – “YOU”
Announced: 15th January
Status: Song selected
Release date: TBA
Back in January, it was announced that Vasil Garvanliev would represent North Macedonia at Eurovision 2020. Although we still don’t know when we are going to hear his song, we do know the titled. Vasil will be singing “YOU” in Rotterdam. The song was composed by Nevena Neskoska – a Macedonian composer and producer, born in Ohrid and raised in Chicago. She studied songwriting at Berklee College of Music. Lyrics are from Nevena Neskoska, Kalina Neskoska and Alice Schroeder.
🇷🇴 Romania: Roxen – TBA
Announced: 11 February
Status: Song to be selected publicly
Release date: 21 February
This week, TVR revealed that Roxen will represent the country at the Eurovision Song Contest 2020. She was selected internally as Romania’s representative by a special jury panel at the songwriting camp, where the songs for Romania’s national final were born.
Roxen will perform five songs at the Selecția Națională 2020. The winning song will be selected by Romanian public together with a jury made up of music professionals. The five songs will be out on February 21st and the final will take place on March 1st.
🇨🇭 Switzerland: TBA – TBA
Announced: 14 February (ish)
Status: Song ready, artist not revealed
Release date: 4 March
This week, Swiss broadcaster SRF confirmed that they’d be taking a similar approach to last year, whereby the song and artist will be revealed together. The entry will be released on March 4th. This year, SRF received 515 submissions for this year’s contest. The broadcaster employed the help of 21 international jurors to help make their decision. They are made up of songwriters, former Eurovision participants and other industry experts.
Confirmed entries so far
As for the other confirmed artists, there have been no public updates, so we’ll just keep a handy list of all the confirmed artists and songs for reference:
- Albania: Arilena Ara – “Shaj”
- Armenia: Athena Manoukian – “Chains On You” (NEW)
- Australia: Montaigne – “Don’t Break Me”
- Austria: Vincent Bueno – “Alive”
- Belgium: Hooverphonic – TBA
- Bulgaria: VICTORIA – TBA
- Cyprus: Sandro – “Running”
- Czech Republic: Benny Cristo – “Kemama”
- France: Tom Leeb – TBA
- Georgia: Tornike Kipiani – “Take Me As I Am”
- Greece: Stefania – “SUPERG!RL”
- Israel: Eden Alene – TBA
- Italy: Diodato – Fai rumore
- Latvia: Samanta Tīna – “Still Breathing”
- Lithuania: The Roop – “On Fire” (NEW)
- Malta: Destiny Chukunyere – TBA
- North Macedonia: Vasil – “YOU”
- Norway: Ulrikke Brandstorp – “Attention” (NEW)
- Romania: Roxen – TBA
- Spain: Blas Cantó – “Universo”
- The Netherlands: Jeangu Macrooy – TBA
Confirmed song selections and release dates
And here are the confirmed dates where national finals will be taking place where entries will be decided or announced:
- 22 February: Poland, Slovenia, Ukraine
- 27 February: Germany
- 28 February: Belarus
- 29 February: Croatia, Estonia, Iceland, Moldova
- 1 March: Romania, Serbia
- 3 March: Israel
- 4 March: Austria, Switzerland
- 7 March: Denmark, Finland, Portugal, Sweden
And you can revisit the past editions of Songwatch below:
Did we miss anything? Let us know! Be sure to stay updated by following @ESCXTRA on Twitter, @escxtra on Instagram and liking our Facebook page for the latest updates! Also, be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to see our reactions to the news in the run up to Rotterdam!
