Benidorm Fest 2022 may have ended with unfortunate eurodrama over the jury-televote split. But Spain’s national selection for Eurovision has been a smashing success in every other sense.
So it’s no wonder why RTVE, Generalitat Valenciana and Benidorm’s City Hall have already verbally agreed to hold a second edition in 2023. Many things are yet to be determined and discussed, but you should start searching for flights to Alicante in Winter 2023.
Official confirmation of the show came minutes after Chanel won the bronze microphone. Region of Valencia’s president Ximo Puig published on Twitter: “See you at Benidorm Fest 2023”. He tweeted about it again on Monday.
Enhorabuena, Chanel.
— Ximo Puig (@ximopuig) January 29, 2022
¡Qué gran espectáculo!
Ahora a por Turín.
Nos vemos en BenidormFest 2023.
(Y antes los Premios Goya en València). pic.twitter.com/P34VlGerb5
Benidorm Fest 2022: A ratings success for RTVE
RTVE have felt the love from TV viewers over Benidorm Fest. The final of its inaugural edition of Benidorm Fest drew 2.97 million viewers.
That represents a 21% share of the TV viewing audience. For comparison, RTVE typically earns a 7 to 8% share of the audience. All three of the shows were the most watched programs of the year so far. Across the three shows, the festival had nearly 10.8 million viewers.
RTVE’s delegation and Eurovision working group are satisfied about the show. After the marathon that has been Benidorm Fest 2022, they will appreciate being able to plan further in advance for next year. The basic infrastructure is set and now they can tweak and amend.
In fact, Head of Delegation, Eva Mora, has commented several times she’s already excited about next year’s edition, as they’ll have the whole year to work on it.
Mora was appointed as Head of Delegation in late August, and the new delegation has had four months to organise a whole festival from scratch in less than four months. Also note that Spain was taking part at Junior Eurovision as well, and it was the same team in charge.
Benidorm Fest 2023: More songs, more events
One thing seems certain: Benidorm Fest will have more songs next year. On Wednesday, María Eizaguirre hosted a press conference where she explained there would be “many more songs”. Several sources point out the number will be over 20, or at least that’s the idea at this stage of preparations.
Another thing that’s certain is that the format of “Benidorm Fest week” was very well received by all three sides, and thus, it’s staying.
However, from a tourist perspective, both local authorities, hoteliers and restorers are eager to expand the activities surrounding Benidorm Fest. Proposals for giant screens in bigger venues than this year are already on the table.
Indeed, in a moment of uncertainty for a city which mostly lives from British tourism, Benidorm has started the quest for Spanish tourists, and Eurovision fans are a perfect target.
This comes along with the idea that more public will attend Benidorm Fest next year. Palau l’Illa will almost definitely have a bigger audience than this year, when only half of the arena was used.
What do you think about Spain’s plans for Benidorm Fest 2023? Are you tempted to go next year? Let us know in the comment section below!
Yes I’m definitely going next year as I couldn’t get tickets for this year unfortunately, as they were so unclear on how to get them etc etc
The big Eurovision drama this year has been ‘staged’. Ay mama song was used in a trashy and cheap tv show from a very trashy tv network specialized in criticizing celebrities and make up all kind of scandals. Jury and demoscopic are needed in order to stop and contain their viewers and avoid them controlling the votes.
I think RTVE should also hold Benidorm Fest Junior to select their Eurovision Junior representative, starting from later this year of 2022. the grown-up edition proves to be a success, albeit with some controversies regarding the results. but, for the Junior Benidorm Fest, it doesn’t have to include two semifinals as in the grown-up one, it doesn’t. a one-night final with eight or ten songs is more than enough. it is somehow like the extended version of the Dutch Junior Songfestival. And, the Junior Benidorm Fest could be held in late September or early October.
Unpopular opinion in 3,2,1… I think they should cancel this Eurojunior thing. Kids need their own places and not a copy of grown ups shows. It is very sad but nowadays the only tv shows for kids (apart from weird cartoon) are: the voice kids, masterchef kids, idol kids… At this rate in no time they will create Big Brother Kids, Tempation Island kids, Blind Date kids…
What they need to do is push the dates forward as much as they can if they want to attract people from other countries. I dont know how late can a country choose its candidate but a BeFest in April could be awesome. Festival, beach and everything in between.
no, BeFest can’t be in April. the latest is the last Saturday before HoD meeting in March.
Thanks to Spanish Eurofans not any relevant Spanish artist wants to compete thanks to how Spanish Eurofans treated Chanel
Tanxu over 70%, Chanel 4%. Rtve will change the results for Torino.
They don’t have to play that big. Anyway 5 people will decide not the Spanish nation
I hope more quantity comes with more quality. It may sound obvious but they really need to make sure beforehand that no matter how good the selected song is, the artist needs to be able to perform live, and avoid situations like Luna Ki which was a mess and a waste. Whatever they do with the voting system, please let it cause less drama next year.
Make the decision a balance (jury and televote), and create an appropiate jury. Choreographers as juries in a song competition? It’s like making a ginecologist performing a brain surgery!
I disagree. Even if they are nominally song contests, Eurovision and the Benidorm Fest require delivering a stage presentation for television. And you do need a choreographer for that unless you’re just going to spend the entire performance sitting behind an instrument. So with staging becoming as important as the song itself, it makes sense that there is a choreographer in the panel to assess the presentation from that standpoint. The panel certainly was lacking on the musical side of things, sure, but that could be addressed for next year.
Benidorm, Eurovision, Melfest… They are not just “song competitions”. Staging is important, sometimes it’s key, we saw it several times and we will continue seeing it.
Year after year Spanish Eurofans have been blaming poor results on staging. This year we have an awesome package and they claim we have to focus on the song… That has been proved disastrous. Spanish musical taste is different: Tu canción, La Venda…
A bigger song selection, bigger production, bigger songs and most importantly, BIGGER DRAMA! Because Spanish eurofans cannot live without it apparently lol. With that being said, RTVE organised a great contest which celebrated many branches of the Spanish music scene and I’m so happy to see not one but three songs from Benidorm fest on the Global 50 and all of the entries on the Spanish top 50. However, they need to change some things as others have pointed out, primarily the voting system, they could do like San Remo and give 33% each, that would be much more balanced… Read more »
Melodifestivalen is basically a national selection for Eurovision, but it also has become a national festival of its own due to SVT’s hardwork they have done since remodelling it in 2002. so Melodifestivalen is also now a combo of both: a selection show and a festival. and I rather want Benidorm Fest to be like that, instead of purely being more separate to Eurovision as Sanremo is. remember that Benidorm is revived by RTVE because they want to do well at Eurovision.
Watch them turn this into Pabandom Is Naujo, please don’t. 😀
1. Ditch Demoscopic voting
2. Replace a 5-member jury panel with 10 international juries
3. 50/50 voting
Et Voila Davis all the little problems are solved for Benidorm Fest next year!
Demoscopic voting needs to stay.
The demoscopic jury had more than 400 people in it, didnt it? And as it is demoscopic it represents all age groups of both genders from all the regions of Spain. It is seriously the best type of jury. Much better than a televote where 70% of all votes come from one specific area only.
But yes, they should either have 10 international juries, or at least spanish music professionals with no relation to any of the participants.
If they improve the voting then yes they need to :
1.Select an appropriate jury
2.make it a 33percent system for all the categories (demoscopic Tele and jury )
Potentially unpopular opinion coming through. In spite of all the complaints, nothing in the jury numbers suggests there was any kind of collusion among the judges against Tanxugueiras (let’s be real, why would any of them award them second-place points if the point was purely to tank them?), but it has surfaced that there were attempts to stack the televote in Tanxugueiras’ favor, which have been discussed already in the comments sections of other articles. So I think giving more power to an audience whose vote is clearly open to be manipulated by outside forces, or that will vote based… Read more »
Agree 100%
I like the way you think!
If I were in charge of Benidorm Fest 2023 I’d keep the percentages as they are and rename the Demoscopic
juryso it would be more clear that those were regular people, not juries. I’d then expand it from 433 to 1.000 voters and have 25 people in the international jury. There would have to be at least 10 foreign jurors and the panel would comprise singers, composers, producers, radio hosts, stage directors, choreographers and heads of delegations.What I missed on the jury were people related to music and not just to music industry. I would like to see as a member of the jury some conservatory teacher, a violinist an opera singer and such. IMO it feels kind of weird that a professional jury ‘forgets’ a wonderful song like Secreto de Agua.
in this first edition they got a lot of feedback to improve the overall experience for the upcoming ones. what’s been done has been done, hopefully they take into account people’s complaints on the voting and everyone can be happy and this can become a yearly tradition for spain.
And in the press conference they said they’re already receiving messages from artists wanting information to participate, so yeah, you’re going to see more Benidorm Fest, this is not the end
Things I’d want for the next year – First and foremost, a new and fair voting system (either expand the number of juries or make their vote as equal as the demoscopic and televote). Giving points based on percentages instead of having fixed points sounds like a good idea too but there’s also cons to that system. – A better sound production quality (this is a thing RTVE still struggles with) – Ad campaigns that promote the city and not just the festival, holding events prior to the actual festival (red carpet, interviews, …) – Separation from Eurovision (I think… Read more »
A Spanish SanRemo. I’m down for that.
Yes, I would like to go (fly) to Benidorm Fest 2023.
Whilst I did really enjoy Benidorm fest before all of the commotion, I really hope RTVE can come up with a new voting system , perhaps the 33% . The quality of Benidorm fest was brilliant and despite the aftermath of this one, I will look forward to this selection next year as I really do feel like its a step in the right direction for Spain and once they sort out what voting system works best for them, it could become a staple in the selection season :).
I really hope this will be some kind of rebirth for Spain in Eurovision. This country has a very interesting musical scene and I wish it would be reflected with good results in Eurovision. Benidorm Fest seems a really good way to achieve that.
I think in the past the trophy was a Mermaid, like how Sanremo’s trophy is a Lion.
It’ll be nice if the Trophy was a Mermaid.
That’s how you reply to drama and toxicity, you work hard and you go big! Congrats to the HoD and the team
That’s some good news (:
Let’s set aside the drama, i’m sure they will think again the voting (something a la san Remo with 33% for each vote instead of 50/25/25 maybe ?), Benidorm Fest 2022 was a gem when it Comes to discovering artists and Amazing New songs !
I will listen ay mama, calle de la lloreria and secreto de agua for a long time (: 3 out of 14 songs is huge imo (considering i also like terra, slomo, postures)