Last month the Georgian Public Broadcaster announced that it would use the upcoming 2019 series of Georgian Idol to select its act for Eurovision 2019. Now Georgia‘s head of delegation Natia Mshvenieradze has confirmed that Idol will also be used to select the song for Tel Aviv.
Natia Mshvenieradze revealed the news in an interview with Radio E-volution. The HoD confirmed that Georgian Idol would be used as the country’s national selection for Eurovision 2019 and she shared more details about how the selection process will work.
She confirmed that initially the contest would focus on selection of singers — the standard Idol format. But after a point, songwriters would be invited to enter songs as Georgia’s potential Eurovision entry. The HoD did not say if this would be open to Georgian songwriters only, or if international songwriters could also apply.
Mshvenieradze also confirmed that the grand final of Georgian Idol would be used to select both the singer and song. In the traditional Idol format, the finalists perform their “winner’s song” — an original song that will be released as the debut singer of the series winner. It is possible that in the case of Georgian Idol, the winners’ songs will all be potential Eurovision entries.
The Head of Delegation noted that applications for Idol are open but she cryptically added, “let’s wait and see how many participants we will have and how will the process be going on.” This implies that the format of the show may be dependent on how many applications the broadcaster receives.
Mshvenieradze also said that Georgia was determined to qualify in Tel Aviv, after having missed out on the grand final for the last two years. She said, “we are looking [at] being in the final and be[ing] successful on the stage.”
Georgia is now the fourth country who will use a television talent show to help select their act for Eurovision 2019. They join Malta (X Factor Malta), Spain (Operación Triunfo) and Israel (Rising Star) to use a popular reality format in their journey to Tel Aviv.
Georgia last qualified for the Eurovision grand final in 2016, when Nika Kocharov & Young Georgian Lolitaz placed 20th with “Midnight Gold”.
Series eight of Georgian Idol is expected to begin in January 2019.
What do you think? Who would you like to see represent Georgia in Tel Aviv? Leave your thoughts below!
Ugh. Not sure if you’re going to get a quality artist through an idol-type competition. Most years, the winners of these series are simply not that memorable or good.
Let’s get Georgia back in the grand final next spring! 😀
I still don’t like the idea of using singing competitions to select a eurovision song but I guess it’s easier on the budget.
Bring back sopho with another banger like visionary dream time for Georgia to get oximated!
I don’t like this. The thing with casting shows is that people will vote for the singer that they personally like the best, regardless of their song and sometimes even regardless of their talent. This happened in Spain last year; viewers didn’t vote for the song, they voted for the Amaia/Alfred romance and we all know how that ended up. I wish they’d just do a traditional national final or an internal selection (same with Malta).
Weren’t there national selections in the past that just choose the singer? Other than Rising Star of course.
I don’t mind those as much, as since it’s a song contest the singer doesn’t matter that much. But when you’re voting for a song based on which singer you like the most — that’s when there’s a problem.
That’s been a longtime problem with the lilrea of MESC, especially if one uses a public vote as it is the best way to measure vox populi.
Totally oximated.
Hopefully it’s nowhere near what the winner’s format was in American Idol Season 1. Kelly Clarkson and Justin Guarini recorded versions of the same song, “In a Moment Like This” with Kelly winning and her song jumpstarting her near twenty-year career.
Basically a one-song selection format is not an ideal format and can be hit or miss, depending on who you ask.
Correction on the song’s name: “A Moment Like This”
Wanna know, wanna know, wanna know what you’re looking fooooor…
Please something like 2012 again 🙂 We need something like that in ESC again and I’m not joking 😉
I think you might have confused 2012 with any other year Georgia has ever competed in.
You must be joking, right? Oh please tell me you are.. ._.
So in theory the best song could win it for the lesser singer or the lesser song could be chosen because it’s paired with the better singer….
““winner’s song” — an original song that will be released as the debut SINGER of the series winner. ” found a typo 😀