Having been present in five consecutive finals with one win to boot, Israel‘s selection system for Eurovision has proven fairly successful. Under this system the Middle Eastern nation has chosen their artist through The Next Star for Eurovision and then chosen the entry internally. But now that is changing.
The artist selection remains the same. But the selection of the song will no longer be behind-closed-doors. According to Ynet, KAN will introduce a new song selection method with a format similar to that of Kdam Eurovision. KAN has named the contest The Next Song for Eurovision, to compliment the artist selection show The Next Star for Eurovision.
Israel’s selection: The Next Song for Eurovision 2020
Members of the Society of Authors, Composers and Music Publishers in Israel may send their songs to KAN until February 11. A KAN-organised committee will then select four songs to participate in the final. These songs will be revealed in late February, ahead of the March 3 final.
ESC 2019 host Lucy Ayoub will host The Next Song for Eurovision 2020 final alongside an unannounced co-host. The winner of The Next Star for Eurovision will be the sole participating artist. The artist will perform all four songs live, then the voting lines will open. The format of the voting will be 30% televote, 65% jury and 5% on-show judging panel. This will mark the first time since 2016 that the Israeli public will have a say in the song’s selection.
The date of Israel’s Eurovision song final: 3 March 2020
The national final will take place on Tuesday, 3 March. This choice of date is rather controversial because Israel’s legislative elections will take place the day before. Since Israeli election results come the following day, viewers would have to alternate between the election of their Prime Minister and their Eurovision representative. Choices!
While early March is relatively late in the Eurovision season, for Israel this is very early. The last time Israel selected their entry on 2 March or earlier was back in 2012.
Do you think this is the right selection method for Israel? Will their continue their qualification streak? Sound off in the comments!
Orr is the simple, natural choice. The man was born to sing, and his performance ability is magnetizing.
BUT – this year there are several strong contestants, all can do well on a Eurovision stage. Ella-Lee, of course, but also Shaki and Moran Aharoni.
Hopefully the public will choose the right song, and not something safe…
I simply hope Ella Lee would be our choice
She is a fantastic performer, she’s great with several genres and has a unique voice 🙂
If only there was justice Moran would easily win, but horny teenagers and all will pick Or.
I just went through the official rules and regulations document dealing with the song submission procedure. One of the clauses there says that “The jury will vote during the recording of the show”. This means that the jury vote is predetermined an not based on the live televised show. It makes you wonder which other elements of the show will be prerecorded. Will the artist just lip-sync or are we getting the real deal? A previous clause states that “The selected songs will be performed by the chosen artist on stage for a live broadcast of a dedicated show to… Read more »
2021 will be better, with a proper multi-artist national final. Maybe they’ll do something like MGP this year and have different semis for different regions of Israel? A Jerusalem semi, a Tel Aviv semi, a Haifa semi, etc… (Unless there are simply too many ways to divide it up).
Someone explain why Niki Goldstein is still in the contest and just advanced again?
He has been eliminated yesterday
My bad I didn’t see he was eliminated.
Are KAN just anticipating a third election stalemate and so don’t care about positioning the song selection just before the Knesset elections? Otherwise it seems kind of irresponsible…obviously countries can’t help if ESC itself is so close to their election dates, but a national final is something in the broadcaster’s hands. But if it works for Israel, then so be it.
The song selection is actually held the day after election day. The date proximity isn’t as big a deal as people make of it. In fact, after more than 24 hours of non-stop news coverage, viewers will look for some form of escapism. It’s a win-win situation for the broadcaster.
It’s disappointing that juries will have a 70% majority control over the choice of the winning song. Furthermore, what’s the point for a separate on-show panel if it only counts for a ridiculous 5% share of the total vote? It doesn’t make much sense. Kan is also being very vague about the jury size. If juries are made of just a few people, it means that once again a chosen few gets to decide for the public. That’s not bringing about change: only an appearance of one.
Exactly! It change nothing, only the apparance. Also if the public has 30% say in the matter, it’s to little to change the outcome of the jury panel. And also 30% votes are on different song/artists so maybe 10% will vote the same result.
That’s 10% public winner against 60% jury winner because jury mostly don’t disagree much on wich is there favorite. The jury is not objective they see and speak to each other.
I’m actualy pleased with the jury’s majority.
It’s a good balance based on past votes patterns and demographic. For example; if it was up to the public vote alone our rep. in 2018 would have been Jonathan Mergi and not Netta – and though I think he would have done great in Eurovision, still I don’t think he would have won like Netta did eventually.
Sadly, jury’s votes have a negative and bad P.R. because of recent years Eurovision fiascos…
I could live with a maximum of 60% jury majority if it were made up of 2 separate juries with a 30% weight for an expert jury (10 members) and another 30% weight for a press jury or a demoscopic jury made of something between a few dozen members up to 100. This would leave a 40% weight to the public. I realize that it’s not worth the trouble for just 4 songs, but this new notion of 70% majority control for the juries goes against fair play and equality in representation. Kan should have at least kept the current… Read more »
Let’s hope they give Ohad 4 good songs to choose from 😉
If this annoying hipster gets chosen, even if Sia will write him a song he won’t qualify to the final. He’s just fails to be likeable.
I think it’s pretty much a done deal that for the first time since 2015, Israel will once again be represented by a teenager.
Ohad doesn’t stand a chance, and I’m not even sure he’s in it to win it.
Hoping Elle AND Or get chosen to perform together. That would be amazing.
He is not Eurovision material, sorry.
I hate one-artist national final, they’re always a waste of time and energy and seem to exist only to give the public the illusion of choice, when it’s actually one predetermined winner against some straw-entries. So I think it should be either an open competition between several artist, or an internal selection.
I am still open to be pleasantly surprised, and hopefully on March 3rd we’ll have a great new entry for ESC 2020 and also a new prime minister for Israel.
Amen!
No politics.please.
It is only for 2020 though. Next year they will have a whole new selection method.
KAN reportedly will take full control of its selection process next year (after letting Keshet take the reins for the past half-decade) so they will probably go for a traditional national selection show (artists with songs competing for a ticket to ESC) or even go internal going forward.
I had gotten the stories twisted. I already heard about there being a national final next year, but I thought that was the one Lucy was hosting (maybe this is a dry run for her hosting that?)
Lucy is involved in many other TV projects on Kan as a scriptwriter, presenter, actress and probably in other capacities too, so hosting a national song selection show is part and parcel of her job description. She was recently interviewed on a major news website where she spoke about the new selection process for 2021: “What I know and can say is that the early elimination rounds will take place on Kan’s digital platform (website and app) as part of the values of the broadcasting corporation. Viewers will have a direct impact in filtering the artist and/or song submissions on… Read more »
Small correction, the Israeli public picked made of stars in 2016, not last picking in 2014 as you said in the post
Correct! Thank you.
Actually I suppose the song was performed by both the participants in the final ? So wasn’t the song already chosen
Two of the finalists sang two different versions of “Made of Stars”, and the third one sang this song, which was my favorite:
https://youtu.be/M2tinS4FXpc
Which is why i’m always nervous when the audience, who usually doesn’t watch Eurovision, chose a song based on what they think Eurovision is.
The third option was by fay the best (Ella Daniel – Somebody out there) . Hovi was the safest choice, but a really bad one.
i believe they were given choices of a few different songs, and then revamp it themselves. Two of the contestants ended up picking the same song to revamp
I liked Made of Stars. More successful than other Israeli attempts to have a swing at a “traditional” Eurovision song. Helps that it was the one and only Doron Medalie who wrote it, since the dude knows his way around a pop song even if bangers are more his style.