It’s the Western European country who turned its fortunes around and is turning out to be a Eurovision power player. Now Belgium‘s broadcaster VRT has revealed details of its 2018 internal selection process. And as a spokesman explains, “everything starts with the artist.”

Earlier in the year, VRT confirmed that they would ditch their usual national final Eurosong in favour of internally selecting the artist for Lisbon. But little has been known about the selection process until now.

Speaking to Songfestival.be, VRT spokesperson Hans van Goethem revealed that a special selection committee has been set up. It includes both staff from within the broadcaster and external experts. Together they are looking for the perfect candidate to represent Belgium in Lisbon next year.

Van Goethem also explained that the broadcaster had already held talks with various artists, both established stars and newcomers.

But he was clear about one thing: “The most important thing is that a good match is found. Everything starts with the artist. Once that choice is made, we will make it known.”

VRT isn’t at that stage yet, but they are “approaching the completion phase.”

Who chooses the song?

As Songfestival.be notes, the last time VRT internally selected a singer was in 2012, when they chose the 17-year-old singer Iris, whose song was later selected in a national final. Some are wondering if VRT will use a similar system this year — though hopefully with better results than 2012.

Iris’ song was selected by the Belgian public via the show Een song voor Iris. She performed two potential Eurovision entries — the emotional ballad “Safety Net” and the Disney-style pop song “Would You?”.

“Would You?” narrowly won the contest and Iris went on to perform it in Baku where it placed second to last in its semi-final, with only Austria’s Trackshittaz placing lower.

The date VRT is going to announce its candidate hasn’t been revealed, but it could be soon. We will keep you up to date when there is more news!

What do you think? Who should represent Belgium in Lisbon? Should VRT use a nation final to select the artist’s song? Share your thoughts below!

READ MORE BELGIUM EUROVISION NEWS

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Jeffrey Day
Jeffrey Day
7 years ago

Ms Van Rossem once again writing about Belgium… As long as there’s nothing really new to present about the upcoming selection, please stop publishing articles like this. Much ado about nothing, hunn-ey!

Kermit
Kermit
7 years ago

The song is what matters….not the singer of stage show. They should remember….

Kermit
Kermit
7 years ago

The song is most important indeed 🙂 Nothing else

Boy From Macedonia
Boy From Macedonia
7 years ago

Bring back Blanche no matter from which part of Belgium she comes.

escphbelgium
escphbelgium
7 years ago

Billie! Billie! Billie!

Ugnius
Ugnius
7 years ago

Well, that’s an interesting opinion from the VRT. Because you can have the best singer in the world and give them boring, outdated and clichè song with zero staging – I am pretty sure the result would be disappointing. So that’s why I disagree with this VRT statement. All three components – artist, song and staging shares equal importance. We have seen lots of examples when good singers with good songs fail just because of the staging (e.g. Ira Losco) or vice versa – staging is very interesting, but the song is not (e.g. Anja Nissen). Belgium seems to know… Read more »

Velorin
Velorin
7 years ago
Reply to  Ugnius

Lmao what do ” odds at the first rehearsals ” even matter when she ended on 4th place in the contest full stop ? These ” odds ” are literally irrelevant at this point

Ugnius
Ugnius
7 years ago
Reply to  Velorin

I agree that most usually odds indicate nothing but in this case I mean that it was improved staging who rose Blanche’s chances to win in many people’s minds…

Margot
Margot
7 years ago
Reply to  Ugnius

Tom Dice was selected before he had a song and that worked out quite well, so that might be where they’re coming from

KA
KA
7 years ago
Reply to  Margot

Loïc Nottet was also selected before there he had written his song. 🙂

Kris
Kris
7 years ago
Reply to  Ugnius

Disagree song is most important…then the artist…..the staging should just not be horrendous and it should work fine

Ugnius
Ugnius
7 years ago
Reply to  Kris

Yeah sure… Jana Burceska didn’t even qualified for the final with decent song, Ira Losco had finished in the middle of the table with quite appealing (unless you have listened to it 10000 times, but it’s not a thing normal Eurovision wiewers (not fans) are doing) song, Charlotte Perrelli finished at disappointing 18th place with a song which was a hit in Sweden and many more countries in 2008. Perfect songs, established singers, next-to-nothing staging – according to your theory, it should have worked fine but as we see it clearly hasn’t…

Frédéric
Frédéric
7 years ago
Reply to  Ugnius

I agree that all three components are important, but the past showed that a perfect match of song and artist can win the contest with a rather average staging (eg. Lena, Ell & Nikki, Conchita, Salvador), while a sensational staging will certainly earn additional points but hardly triumph on its own (with “Hero” possibly being an exception to the rule;).
There may be even more factors like the overall quality of the competition, timing/trends and yes, even politics, but to me the chemistry of singer & song is most important.

Anca_80
Anca_80
7 years ago

It is a song competition, the song is the most important. I’m from Romania and I’ve discovered this blog one year ago. Until then, I had no idea that are countries that select singer and song separately, not even thought this is possible. It seems it is possible. I’ve noticed that in poor countries like mine, the broadcaster only provides the stage, but the singer must bring the song/dancers/staging. In rich countries, the broadcaster is in control, and the singer only has to bring…the voice. It sounds good for the singer, but I don’t know if it is effective. Will… Read more »