Romania Announces Calendar for ‘Selectia Nationala’ 2013

The Romanian broadcaster TVR announced today that songwriters can submit their compositions for the national selection between 14 January and 3 February.

In previous years the selection consisted of one televised show judged by a jury and televoters. This year, however, TVR will stage two semifinals and a final to be broadcast on 23 February, 24 February, and 9 March, respectively. Each semifinal will include between 12 and 14 songs.We will find out what song will represent Romania in Malmö during the final, where the public and the jury will choose the winner from among 12 finalists.

There’s more. A preselection will be organized between 6-14 February, when all the entries will be performed live, in front of the jury, in five major cities across the country. According to the organizers, this is done in order to encourage “new talent” to participate and also to make sure that the contestants “can really perform the submitted song live” before they sing in front of a national (and, indeed, international) audience. No word yet on who is on the jury. The list of songs selected for the semifinals will be announced on 18 February.

We welcome this ambitious decision. Not only will we have three shows and at least 24 tunes to cheer for and choose from, but hopefully the songs in the final will be less dull than at last year’s Selectia Nationala. With few exceptions—including our favourite, “Zaleilah” by Mandinga—most of the other songs were lackluster.

This also means that TVR has not followed in the footsteps of the Netherlands, who picked a famous singer (Anouk) without a selection, which basically means that international superstar Inna, left, will not represent Romania, as previously hoped and rumored. Nonetheless, the race is on and there is enough musical talent around to come up with a killer song. We certainly know one name that will be on the list of applicants: Natalia Barbu from Moldova. (Read more about the subject of who should participate and who could win for Romania.)

Are you looking forward to the Romanian selection? Do you think the country that brought Paula Seling, Luminita Anghel and Mandinga on the Eurovision stage can do better in 2013? Let us know below!

Bogdan Honciuc is a Transylvania-based correspondent for wiwibloggs. Follow him on Twitter @stingoo.