Italian-Swiss broadcaster RSI has decided the results of its online poll to select RSI’s three wildcard entries for the Swiss internal selection process. Julie Meletta, Sebalter and Scilla Hess were confirmed as the three entries who will progress to the next stage of the Swiss national selection.
Back in August, Switzerland’s national broadcaster SRF announced a rejuvenated and revamped national selection, ditching the illustrious “Die Entscheidungsshow” in favour of a more closed process. What’s more, Swiss Eurovision fans were invited to complete a survey to get the chance to judge the potential entries to represent Switzerland at the 2019 contest.
A little while after that announcement, the broadcaster for the Italian region of Switzerland, RSI, revealed that they were making things more open by inviting the general public to help shortlist a few potential candidates through an online poll. Thirteen songs sung by ten different artists were in the mix and there were numerous familiar faces competing for the public’s attention: Scilla Hess from 2011, Matteo Rossi from 2016 and, most significantly, Sebalter.
The poll ran from the beginning of September for around 20 days and closed on Friday the 28th of September at 12:00 CET. Earlier today, however, RSI surprised us by holding a live streamed results show of the poll. The show contained live performances of the six most popular songs according to the online poll and eventually revealed who placed highest among the top six — with the top three receiving a wildcard.
The results show that Julie Meletta with “Mama (I Walk Alone)”, Sebalter with “We’ll Carry the Light” and Scilla Hess with “Playground” each received a wildcard entry from the poll as their entries had received the most amount of votes.
Nevertheless, the outcome may still come as a surprise as many fans predicted that Sebalter would come out on top. Reality paints a different picture as Julie Meletta pipped Sebalter to the top of the poll by one point with her upbeat number “Mama (I Walk Alone)”.
Perhaps the reason why this result comes as such a surprise is due to Sebalter being such a well-known figure within the Eurovision community. Moreover, given the good result he earned for the mountain nation back in 2014, many saw him as being potentially able to bring Switzerland back to the final again.
No matter. His Instagram shows just how happy and relieved he is.
The results of our poll predicted a somewhat different outcome. Sebalter finished well ahead with almost double the amount of votes over Scilla Hess in second place. Furthermore, the winner of RSI’s poll, Julie Menetta, only managed to amass 27 votes in ours, putting her entry seventh out of 13.
Another surprise comes from Matteo Rossi, who took part in the 2016 national selection. With 44 votes, he managed to reach fourth place in our poll, but tonight, was nowhere to be seen. Apparently international tastes vary from local tastes in the extreme!
Regardless of the differences between the two polls, RSI have three quality entries as wildcards and we wish the best to Scilla, Sebalter and Julie for their onward journey in Switzerland’s internal selection.
Oh well, I really liked ,,Until you will be mine”, but these songs are good awell. Gonna be rooting for Playground from now on, but we don’t know what Kind of other ongs Switzerland has to offer.
Good luck Julie !!! Mama looks so much like Switzerland in 2011, Malta 2013 and 2014. Good luck to my Switzerland !!!!
Lmao, I know the Nick Antik guy. We used to talk in 2012-3.
I am so happy for Scilla Hess! PLAYGROUND 😀
Where is the results show?
Outrageous. I don’t even know the song that won but obviously, first place can only go to Sebalter. He carries the light. What can be more important than carrying the light?
Sharing it? :3
In order to be sharing it, you gotta be carrying it.