For months Eurovision fans have wondered aloud whether Russia’s Channel 1 would make good on its promise to send Julia Samoylova to Eurovision 2018 following Ukraine’s ban on the singer last year. There had been such a long silence from the broadcaster that fans were skeptical when Julia announced her participation on Facebook on January 26, and again when her management confirmed to us that she was, indeed, singing at Eurovision.
Well the speculation can now stop, as Channel 1 has finally and officially confirmed her participation in a statement published this evening.
“The decision was made last year after [the broadcaster] was forced to withdraw from Eurovision 2017,” the statement reads. “Julia has already started preparing for the contest.”
On Friday the blonde singer teased fans with images she described as “training for Eurovision”, along with the news that she was working with Polina Gagarina’s Eurovision stage director.
“This is the start of the training for Eurovision!” the ebullient singer wrote on her Facebook page. “At Last! Met our team with Director-Director Alexei Golubev, discussed the future number. The song has already been chosen, so now we work.”
In an e-mail message sent to wiwibloggs, her management said:
“Julia and her husband offered several songs of his own composition. But as a result decided to choose a song of other authors. The Russian broadcaster has confirmed Julia’s participation. Now is preparing for the contest, recording a song and staging a show program.”
That followed on from the January 13 news that Julia had prepared two songs as potential Eurovision entries. Julia was said to have co-written two songs with her husband/manager Alexei Taran (a romantic who likes to read her poetry under the moon).
Long wait for Julia
Today’s news will surely put Julia’s fans at ease, as they’ve long wondered whether she would fulfil her wish of singing at ESC.
In October Russian website So Groovy reported that Julia discussed the issue during a live chat with her fans. The “Flame is Burning” singer revealed that while she still hadn’t heard from the broadcaster, she remained hopeful. Barring some sort of apocalyptic outcome, Julia seemed determined to make it to Lisbon.
“Regarding the Eurovision song — no guys, the song for Eurovision has not even been chosen yet. Well, they say that I will go. I hope that the end of the world won’t come and everything will be fine … And we will go to Eurovision.”
In a video accompanying the announcement, Julia discusses her Eurovision dream and the various hurdles she has overcome. You may recognise the footage: It was intended to be used in the run-up to Eurovision 2017 and was previously uploaded to YouTube.
“In 2000 I saw Alsou at Eurovision and decided than that I wanted to sing there too,” she says.
In terms of her career she says that “Eurovision will change absolutely everything” and that “my favourite Eurovision song is Molitva by Marija Serifovic. It gave me goose bumps”
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When will the West learn that Russia is not the kind of a country to change its decision every day. BTW congratulations to the Russian Olympians. The court in Switzerland has proved today that all the fuzz over doping was made up and nonsense.
Sure haha Those 4 persons who helped to “prove” Russian sportsmen are “innocent” are all miraculously connected to Russia via personal and business links. I’m afraid that could be a separate case for them.
So pleased to have Russia back.
Why can’t the Russian act sing about peace & love, if that’s what they want to do? It is a singer, not the government, on stage.
So, what kind of song she is going to sing?! Probably, the same 90`s russian ballades taste.
Omg, one more song about how “peaceful and innocent Russia is”.. pretty sure her entry will get the most attention on Wiwibloggs, and the main editor together with other so called bloggers will necessarily mention how “bad bad Ukraine” did not let in a poor disabled person. Those Westeners never learn. As if there had been no MH17, no annihilation of Grozny with its civilians, no annexation of Crimea and Donbas invasion. Disgusting
As I stated a few days ago: this is the wrong decision. The quality of her past attempt was very low. The song was terribly dated and her voice sounded strange. Her English accent was also bad.
If they aren’t going to fix that I prefer she stays at home. I don’t want Russia to gain even more points for extra musically reasons. Russian Diaspora votes + disability sympathy votes= TOP 5 guaranteed.
At least, I hope they come up with a good song. I wouldn’t like to see Russia up there with a crappy song.
That will be the-worst year that Russia will have in Eurovision , they even may not qualify from that semi final , yep , you heard it 1st here , no Russia in the final again this year!
And, another year, contestant’s health condition will be more important than music. She will win and in 2019 no LGBTs or black people allowed to participate in Moscow. Eurovision Horror Story: Nazi Russia.
Read something before you write such nonsense. Google is your friend.
I don’t think you even know what the word “Nazi” means. Nazis killed millions of Russians during WW2 and you’re branding Russians Nazis. Learn before you write.
NKVD killed millions of people too
Stalin killed more than nazis did. Who gives more, who gives more, Genghis Khan is the winner.
Yes, like Poland won in 2015 with Monika. And of course, Salvador only won because of his heart condition… Ridiculous
Pepeka, you are the first 3-year old that can write English! You have a very high IQ!
Well done, Russia!
This is great news…..for Alekseev.
I’m just worried that she is in the same semi final as Ukraine
So so so glad for Julia! She’ll have her dream come true. Hope not to be misunderstood here, but I don’t want her story be above the song itself. I don’t want for example Russia to win because of her, but because the song deserves it!
Looking forward to the song! Hope it’s good!
I just hope its not another sad boring ballad like her entry last year. After sending their very best Sergey Lazarev in 2016, they had to follow it up
Congrats Yulia!! And kudos Russia for proving the haters wrong haha 😉
Do you think that Ukraine will withdraw?? I don’t think so!!
The ban was so stupid to begin with.. Congratulations to Julia, hope she has an even better song than last year
Disabled or not, she is a bigoted woman who got what she deserved last year. Russia is not tolerant of disabled people and she is just a massive PR stunt. It’s obvious Russia are less fussed than previous years about winning, so they are just sending her. Russia should prepare for a very poor result.
Have you ever been to Russian to make such claims? Well maybe then you should keep queit and to yourself in your lonely, uneducated corner of lies and hatred 🙂 Because a person who wishes another naition such negativity and is accusing of things not being aware of can IN NO WAY use the word ‘tolerant’ in her sentence, that is just not your vocabulary sweetheart. Every person who has went to Russia was absolutely shocked, shocked to that reality is so different from what is perceived and that it is actually absolutely awesome, with warm and welcoming people. So… Read more »
I’m of Russian descent and you couldn’t pay me to go back to Russia. Not even a million dollars would persuade me. It is every bit the intolerant place that everyone sees it is.
Btw, I hope they will give her an upbeat song with a bit of ethnic element and in Russian! It would be fun! Being disabled doesn’t mean you must sing a balade with cheesy mood/lyrics.
Fair enough. They promised her and they’re honoring their word. But she needs a better song than “Flame is Burning”. Especially now that we know that the draw wasn’t very kind to Russia.
Ukraine has no right to ban her performance regardless of Ukrainian laws. Please remember what happened to Lebanon back in 2005 – they chose the song, but then stated they will not broadcast Israeli performance.
If you join EBU, you accept EBU regulations on how the show should be broadcasted. Overall, I am tired of Russian-Ukrainian drama year after year and it seems they will continue this way again in 2018.
And yea, welcome back Russia. It is always to see more countries join the ESC.
Congratulations to Julia. 🙂
Now time for the bigger decisions…
Time for the HoD of Ukraine to get on the phone to the appropriate people and sort out making a decision regarding which law/rule to break (either EBU rule, or transmitting banned artist law). Also, it would be prudent to contact all of the competing artists in the National Finals and keep them up to date on the situation. (If I were competing in Ukraine and heard this news, I might start making assumptions. These are never good.)
Hopefully. Ukraine’s broadcaster anticipated this since this was in the papers last year so the possibility of Julia coming back next year has always been there.
And would the national government really wanna put to waste an nth amount of money and effort spent by its public broadcaster, and STB’s time of holding a national selection?
I guess we will find out in good time. 🙂
I just hope that the Ukranian organisers are able to deal with the situation efficiently and quickly.
In my opinion, Julia had an administrative violation, not criminal, and the ban on broadcasting extends only to criminal. At least last year, fragments of her song were shown in Ukrainian news and some TV shows.
Good.
If Ukraine has to withdraw now, will the semi-finals have 19 and 17 countries or will a country from semi 1 be moved to semi 2 in order to get equally sized semi-finals?
Thank you Russia, for being a country of your word! Welcome, Yulia!
i love “flame is burning” and i thought it would’ve done well last year if not for the withdrawal last year. looking forward to her new entry!
that was such a boring song…
I¨m thinking Russia might be headed towards it’s worst result in years..
Despite of the (political) reasons why Russia tried to send Julia to Kiyv, it’s good to know the broadcaster keeps the promise and give another chance to her. However, they should choose a good song in Russian, instead of an English one, because all we realized how Julia’s insecure and now, after allocation draw, knowing Russia’ll be singing at 2nd SF… maybe country’s favoritism won’´t be the same with Sweden, Australia, Romania and Poland competing during that night.
Echoing what’s already been said, I just hope they give her something close to the best song ever written and as different as can be than “Flame is burning’…
I am scRIHming. I would have never guessed that they would actually send her.
Well, whatever her song is, I hope they don’t exploit her condition for sympathy votes. I hope they focus on sending a good song instead of highlighting Julia herself. Because if they truly want to normalize disabled people performing at Eurovision, the disability shouldn’t be the focus.
Flame still is burning! And Russia’s chances to win too.
Good for Julia, and good on the Russian broadcaster for keeping their promise to her. Now just make sure to give her a song worth singing, unlike last year
I hope they give her a good song, because I feel that last year they just used her in a horrible way. Her song was nothing like other Russian songs – they are very serious about Eurovision and their entries are usually well-produced and catchy. And “Flame is burning” was nothing like that. I think that they knew she would be disqualified. They just wanted to make Ukraine look bad. I can remember headlines saying “Ukraine disqualifies disabled singer from Russia” as if the disability was the cause. It was a game and it was not fair. They didn’t give… Read more »
Probably they approached some other artists, but those artists did not accept to take the place of a poor woman with disabilities and have a PR disaster, so at the end they had to keep their promise. That is why the announcement took so long.
Exactly thr the same thoughts
I am beyond shocked this actually happened, but it is a positive development. Now let’s see a good show from Russia and Julia.
Well, crisis of “ploy” averted or her voice was loud enough for Russian Channels to hear.
Ok, she will either win the whole thing, or will be the first Russian contestant failing to qualify for the final, if she will send another entry like Flame is burning.
Good for her & for her dreams. I do hope that she gets a better song as her semi is a very tough one. Russia would lose face if they didn’t send her after their promise last year, so they should just make the best of the situation by giving her a killer song, not one of those peace songs
I think Russia is still in it to win it, the fact they rejected her husband’s songs kind of suggests they want something of a high-calibre (unless they were just awful) we’ll have to wait and see. Irrespective of all the Politics surrounding this, it is great to see people with disabilities continuing to get a platform on the Eurovision stage.
If she sends a good song, awesome. If she doesn’t, whatever. She seems like a decent person, so I wish her the best, but Russia have consistently been the most overrated country in the contest because they try too hard. Ease up a bit, focus on a good song and presentation before going nuts with the pyrotechnics, then let the chips fall where they may.
nope Sweden has
I’d agree with you if we were talking about the ’00s where Sweden got points for all the average Europop they sent, but I dunno, they’ve kinda hit a sweet spot in recent years between good songs and good shows (although some have definitely been very overrated – while I enjoyed songs like Se pa mig, Undo, and If I Were Sorry, none were worthy of the top 5). I’m also a Robin apologist – his was the first 2017 song I listened to (well after the fact) and I was very impressed, although his Melodifestivalen performance was better than… Read more »
Although i agree that Sergei focused too much on staging rather than the song, Polina was absolutely amazing with very simplistic stage and main focus on the voice. And ironically she lost to a show-song from Sweden…
I will agree that Polina was the best Russian act in YEARS when she performed and deserved her high marks, and hers was an example of song over show (and even then, the lyrics were pretty generic “love love peace peace” stuff – it was the melody, especially the chorus, and her voice that put it over big-time). Personally, I preferred Belgium and Italy over both of them, but it just happened to be an amazing top 5 that year, all all-time great Eurovision songs.
Good for her, end of story and end of political drama. Russia, Ukraine and other countries that are feuding need to get their acts together and remember that this is a song contest. I want to enjoy good music and artists, that’s all. Nothing more, nothing less.
It’s not an end to the political drama. She’s a banned artist. It’s illegal for Ukraine to broadcast her performance. But it’s also against the rules of the contest to not broadcast it. So Ukraine will likely not be competing now.
Where did you get it from? It is not illegal. Last year Ukraine was ready to broadcast it via satellite.
No they weren’t actually. Both Russia and Ukraine said broadcasting via satellite was unacceptable for different reasons though obviously.
Actually it s nice that she really gets the chance, I didn‘t expect this for her.
But please give her a russian song!!! Her english is just too bad like in flame is burning
Since Russia is in the deadly semi, it would be a great opportunity to leave this crap in the semi. The best thing actually will be a final with neither Russia nor Ukraine, to teach them a lesson.
And also only in the first half of that semi
I agree with you and Matj above. They are in the first half of that ‘deadly’ semi, so that won’t help. Nor will it help if she sings in English. But a song in Russian will stand out and qualify easily, I think.
YASS
Oh no I think Russia is in danger of not qualifying especially if they do a song similar to Flame is Burning, which was awful. I’m sure Channel One secretly wanted to send someone else but were forced to send Julia because if they didn’t, it would look like they were using her as a political pawn. Also, Julia probably made that early Facebook announcement in order to pressure Channel One to send her.
Gorilla716, I completely agree with everything you said! I believe that they are only sending her because of the ‘promise’ they made last year. I feel like if it weren’t for the whole debacle that happened last year with Yulia and Ukraine, she probably wouldn’t be Russia’s pick for Eurovision. I feel like they are only sending her because they feel they have to. Shame really. But I am interested to hear her song, I just hope it’s nothing like Flame is Burning because that was just awful (in my opinion.)
Yeah and if Yulia does qualify, it’ll only be because she’s from Russia.
You are assuming a lot of things.
I agree with you completely. If they didn’t send her and make good on their promise they would basically prove to everyone they were using her as a pawn (which they were). I just hope she gets a better song than “A flame is burning” that was crap. If she gets a song like that, she’s not getting to the final.
You know it’s funny, when her participation was up in the air, everyone was saying that it would be horrible for her not to participate and it would confirm that Russia only sent Julia as a pawn to make Ukraine look bad. Now that Russia has confirmed Julia is participating, you’re saying that Russia is obligated to send her because if they didn’t, they’d look like they sent her as a pawn. So are you happy that Russia sent her, or annoyed that Russia sent her.
I just want her to not suck. If she doesn’t suck, I’ll either be sad she misses the final or happy she does. If she does, I’ll either be pleased if she misses the final or pissed if she does. Unless the performer is a complete and total prima donna, which Yulia doesn’t totally strike me as (but what do I know?), I seldom actively hope they fail. Although failing to make the final could do a bit to make Russia reconsider how their entries should look and sound.
@Michael, it seems whatever Russia does it is always guilty. I am not trying to support Russian side in this dirty Russia vs Ukraine game, but it seems people are finding fault on the Russian side and never see what is happening in wider context.