Wonder no more! After being one of Spain’s most awaited mysteries on this road to Tel Aviv, RTVE has finally confirmed the date of the Eurovision Gala — and it’s coming very soon. Spain’s National Final will be held on Sunday 20 January.
In contrast to last year’s Eurovision Gala, this year’s show comes on a busy weekend. At least five countries will have shows running that weekend. France, Hungary and Lithuania will advance their selections on Saturday, while Malta’s Third X-Factor live show takes place the same day as Spain’s final.
?Los espectadores eligen el domingo 20 de enero en @La1_tve la candidatura española para Eurovisión 2019 @eurovision_tve
??10 propuestas para Tel Aviv
??@RobertoLealG ? @TonyAguilarOfi @PastoraSoler @ManuelMartos78 y Doron Medalie
??@foureira_eleni?https://t.co/v9bakCjLIw pic.twitter.com/HfYlp47kgt
— RTVE Comunicación (@RTVE_Com) January 11, 2019
But as with every Spanish Gala, it’s a late one. The Spanish final will begin at 22:05h CET.
Confirmed details
Ten songs and nine artists will compete to win the Spanish ticket to Tel Aviv.
Two days after the results of the online vote selectedMaria, Noelia and Natalia, RTVE revealed another lucky seven. The complete list — that includes OT 2018 winner Famous — remains as follows:
- María Villar – “Muérdeme”
- Noelia Franco – “Hoy vuelvo a reír otra vez”
- Natalia Lacunza – “La Clave”
- Carlos Right – “Se te nota”
- Famous Oberogo – “No puedo más”
- Julia Medina – “Qué quieres que haga”
- Marilia Monzón – “Todo bien”
- Miki Núñez – “La venda”
- Natalia & Miki – “Nadie se salva”
- Sabela Ramil – “Hoy soñaré”
The winner is in the audience hands, meaning no jury (nor a potentially controversial one) will have any vote. But four faces will sit in the oh-so-famous OT jury chairs to offer commentary. They are: Manuel Martos (OT jury member and Universal Spain executive producer), Pastora Soler (ESC 2012), Tony Aguilar (Los 40 Principales) and Doron Medalie (songwriter of Netta’s “Toy”).
The show won’t only welcome Pastora and Doron’s familiar faces, but also a chart-topping diva. Eleni Foureira — who finished second in Lisbon in 2018 — is calling and we’re fly-fly-flying in heaven. Fiery as ever, Eleni is expected to burn the stage — and the nation!
More artists are yet to be announced. Stay tuned!
Full songs on January 17
It’s game on! Rehearsals are well underway in Barcelona and all of the finalists are in the process of polishing the final versions of their songs.
?¡Mira nuestro resumen con lo mejor de los ensayos de los #10Eurotemazos!?
?? https://t.co/BNLc9YE8TX pic.twitter.com/QyoIUEWodg— eurovision_rtve (@eurovision_tve) January 10, 2019
And RTVE has nothing but good news for you! Full versions are set to be premiered on January 17th at 15:00h CET and will go fully online on January 18th. That is – as promised – 24 hours before the National Final.
While the OT 2018 Eurovision Gala is now full steam ahead, there has been some criticism. The Christmas season brought plenty of drama as people sensed nothing but complete apathy coming from the finalists. There are two clear exceptions: Famous and Noelia.
The process has seen some turbulent moments with many fans saying they will only vote for those acts who are enthusiastic about going to Eurovision. This year is no exception and the Spanish broadcaster is once again facing demands for a new selection process and a fairer method of assigning songs to singers.
What do you think about this year’s Eurovision Gala? Are you excited for January 20? And do you have any favourite #Eurotemazo already? Tell us in the comment section below!
TVE´s mythical incompetence makes me cringe too. Spain is one of the most Eurovision friendly countries in Europe but TVE still finds a way to disappoint every year. I guess what they really want is a comeback of the 90´s, when most people was thinking that Eurovision had been cancelled many years ago and they didn’t have any pressure as audiences were below zero.
But at least we get Foureira every second day in Spain. She has made more for the Eurovision brand here than 60 years of TVE involvement.
I honestly feel like they are actually TRYING to do something, but it ends up with another disappointment. I think they will go for an internal selection next year.
Next year – Rules of OT: 50 people can apply with their own songs, but only 20 can apply without a song. Who applies without a song will have to record one in a week. A jury of 5 international child voters will help pick among the 12 ones available online. Next stage is that only 25 artists are picked, 15 though national jury of one producer, 2 musicians and 2 megafans, and 10 are picked through online voting. In online voting, you have to pick 10 favorite artists and 5 more for backup. Then they go live, and they’ll… Read more »
Spain aren’t doing themselves any favours. They should just use this like XFactor Malta instead of going through some underproduced live shows. Spain are pretty much broke.
Jokes about eurozone countries being bailed out like ten years ago are not exactly funny nor accurate in this context.
Maria’s personality is really starting to p*ss me off. Her song is the best, however she has a big thing about it being in Israel and therefore doesn’t want to go! Well gurl…why go on OT in the first place.
I saw the clip of her rehearsal and the beat has changed and it’s now duller. Is she trying to sabotage her song or something?
You can’t have the cake and eat it too…
They need to learn how to talk
(not insulting the host country- aka israel)
and start to behave like adults who care about their family, career and spain.
Maybe it’s time to permanently do away with Operación Triunfo, or at least stop using it as the Eurovision national final. It no longer brings in results (Almaia’s 23rd place is quite the far cry from the mini-golden age of Rosa, Beth and Ramón) and the revival of OT has given us two of the most absurdly convoluted ESC selection processes in recent memory, not to mention the batch of apathetic and/or anti-Israeli contenders from this year (which they could have thought about before signing the contestant’s contract, since by then it was already known that Eurovision would be in… Read more »
So it seems some of the participants have a problem not only with Israel but just with Eurovision in general? Oh dear, Spain. Well, it will be interesting to see how this all goes.
What a cringefest this will be.
Can’t they just send Pastora again instead of the rookies? She’s actually got the Fuego.
But seriously, can anyone blame any contestant for not being excited about going to Eurovision? They have to go for the Spanish broadcaster, for god’s sakes. So it’s not a question of if, it’s just a question of how (much) it will screw them over. Arguably the screwing already started with the songs they gave them.
Can’t believe there are people who would vote for someone only because this one said he/she would like to go to Eurovision even if he/she does NOT have a good song to represent their country. Ladies and gentlement, RTVE is not a goldfish and we need A SONG. So Famous NEXT.
PS: Noelia said she would go to Eurovision when she was out of the Academy. So she’s out and you think she would say she doesn’t want to go to Eurovision when it’s the only thing left? Think.
Again. THE SONG. Thank you.
I agree with your statement, even though I really like Noelia’s song (the demo version, anyway). But I am still unsure how this contest works. If someone is against going to Eurovision, shouldn’t that be something to be discussed BEFORE the contest, not after. Sure, participating in OT is a separate thing, but they should have refused to make online voting songs. This way, it’s dishonest from them and Tv house likewise.
RTVE did (as usual) a terrible job handling this issue. I suppose those who don’t want to go to Eurovision still want to be in the competition because they want their singles to be a hit like “Lo Malo”, but what’s the point about participating if you already stated that you don’t want the winner prize? So maybe the contestants were obliged to participate because of their OT contract and now RTVE can’t rule them out and reassign the songs to other singers because of the same contract. What a mess.