On Thursday evening Montenegro’s state broadcaster RTCG confirmed that it was withdrawing from Eurovision 2023 in Liverpool.
And on Friday Brooklyn-based singer ENISA revealed that she was meant to represent the country at the contest.
ENISA, real name Enisa Nikaj, was born in New York to Albanian parents originally from Tuzi in Montenegro.
Replying to the ESC Discord Twitter account she said: “Sad, I was suppose to represent them in Eurovision 2023. But they couldn’t find a way to finally support it.”
Sad, I was suppose to represent them in #Eurovision 2023. But they couldn’t find a way to financially support it ?
— ENISA (@IAmENISA) October 14, 2022
This summer I went to Montenegro, They asked to meet with me & ask if I’d represent them & I said yes, I even did an interview for their TV right after one of the meetings you can see on YouTube. I was happy to help them go far this year, also the song I had selected was big ??
— ENISA (@IAmENISA) October 14, 2022
ENISA had the huge honour of representing the state of New York at the inaugural edition of the American Song Contest earlier this year.
Her song “Green Light” was a toe-tapping number with plenty of swagger and attitude.
She made it all the way to Semi-Final 2.
She signed with Atlantic Records in 2019 and has had several successful singles. In 2020 she went viral in Nigeria with her song “Love Cycle,” and she featured on Rayvanny’s “Number One (Remix)” in 2021.
Two weeks ago, she passed one million subscribers on YouTube. ENISA is LOVED.
Why nobody suggests a Kickstarter or goFundMe page to help to cover the financial costs?
Because it simply shouldn’t have to come down to that.
The EBU needs to help smaller countries with their participation fee, not the public.
True. It’s simply not sustainable.
Looking at the bright side, countries that take time off tend to do well after they return so hopefully we will see the withdrawing broadcasters come back stronger.
I expect when she says “BIG” she doesn’t mean something like “Green Light” because it wouldn’t have made it through the SFs.
She probably couldn’t afford a good song…
I seriously wanted to see how it would turn out ot have a asc contestant on ESC
She’s one of the artists that I’d gotten into after ASC this year and would’ve been a great representative for Montenegro, and a sign that they might’ve been sending a relevant, mainstream, competitive song to the contest this year.
It’s a shame it won’t be happening.
I was supposed to play Hercules in the Live Action remake but they scrapped it for Little Mermaid instead, I had bought the gym membership and everything :/
I’m super sad for her. She was great in the American Song Contest. She would have done well at Eurovision.
Oh dear it would have been a disaster for them if they sent her
RTCG had also sent me an email about participating at Eurovision 2023 for it and Montenegro.
IDK who this is but just from that Tweet I already know her entry would have been trash.
Do you guys think ENISA will release her Eurovision entry?
Why doesn’t the EBU help Montenegro out?
They secured the artist and the song, but the participantion fee was raised. Why doesn’t the EBU help out it’s participants, we are looking at a record low ESC in terms of countries participating if one more withdraws only 36 will compete lowest since 2008 and 2014…
Why these countries don’t do propper taxes to help their public broadcaster out rather than push the bills for other countries? If they can’t afford to participate, they couldn’t even host it. So who would host if they’d win?
Let’s ruin every country’s financial situation, so people can say that they paid another country’s fees so an artist from another country can get more European wide publicity.
Lmao that’s not how things work honey
Every country has a fee that is reasonable considering the country’s GDP, it’s unfair for others to lower one’s fee simply because they refuse to pay theirs. EBU is in no position to “help out”, maybe you’d know that if you would read EBU’s annual payment plans.
Wow… why is this suddenly the saddest Eurovision news of today 🙁 I had HOPED for Enisa to represent Montenegro for the past couple of years. And now this.. I always thought she wouldn’t want to be part of the contest coz she lives in America. But the participation in American Song Contest gave me hope and now actually reading she was meant to represent them in 2023.. *sigh*
no way! i had entered a fan contest with her for montenegro earlier this year, and i thought she would be an ideal candidate for montenegro. this is such a missed oppurtunity really
We could’ve had a New Yorker at Eurovision! My heart…try for Albania dude!
What New Yorkers have there been so far? Hungary 2014… anyone else?
Sue of Peter, Sue, and Marc for sure. There’s definitely more than that, plus I think a few non-natives have studied/are based in NYC.
Oh yeah, Lesley Roy. I’ll count Frances Ruffelle too.
Edyta Gorniak and Shiri Maimon (among others) have, like Frances, also performed on Broadway. Marlain (Cyprus 1999) is also based here.
Eurovision, the Musical. Coming to Broadway 2024.
Joe, please produce, you are the best man for the job.
I mean, it’s not like I haven’t thought that thought. An actual Eurovision jukebox musical would be lit (I know they’ve done musicals in Denmark like that with songs from Eurovision and DMGP), it would just be a matter of how to work songs of wildly different styles, tempos, genres, and (most importantly) language within a plot, cuz I would want there to be something resembling an actual plot. I’ve had thoughts about having the hook be a guy traveling around Europe so he can finally get inspiration to write something great (like Eat, Pray, Love meets Moulin Rouge). This… Read more »
Good idea. The hardest part would be picking the 24 songs. What would be the 11 o’clock number? The opener? Act One finale? We can’t have Waterloo, I imagine, Mamma Mia own that. Te Deum for the overture. My own loose idea is to have a contest of some sort as the story, with the audience deciding the winner/ending. A bit like Mystery of Edwin Drood. Who to cast? Maybe we can get Tony winner Ruffelle, she can sing Lonely Symphony eight times a week.
Early number, Rock ‘n’ Roll Kids. A wistful older couple, played by Mandy Patinkin and Bernadette Peters, look back on times past. Act One closer, Rise Like a Phoenix. A downtrodden Idina Menzel finally finds the courage to confront the villains who have made her suffer. She will reek her revenge in Act Two. 11 o’clock, Hold Me Now. An emotional Cynthia Erivo says her final goodbyes to Aaron Tveit, before embarking on the first manned mission to Mars. Comedic interlude, Wadde Haadde Dudde Dah. Performed by Norbert Leo Butz and ensemble. Finale, Hallelujah. A happy ending as everybody lives… Read more »
Lindita Hallimi (Albania 2017) lived in New York I believe, could be wrong but I am 99% sure about it.
I know she’s in like Scottsdale now or something.
I don’t see anyone complaining that she doesn’t live in Montenegro or she is not a big local name. Only Greece gets backlash for that but the others get a pass love the double standards of this toxic community
Bc people from Montenegro doesn’t know this information before, and doesn’t know her as well xD
But this is interesting .. RTCG or someone else wanted her, but they couldn’t found money.
Maybe some other artist from Montenegro, who was cheaper or could found money to finance them, can go.
I see this as only Enisa or no one else.
The article has been here about fifteen minutes, and it’s not going to happen anyway… but just to please you… she doesn’t live in Montenegro! She is not a big name! A disgrace!
I don’t care where people live, what’s their skin colour, their sexuality and their body type. If they can sing well and have a good song they should be able to represent any country 🙂
I believe neither Montenegro neither Greece(my country) artists and representatives should get hate for living somewhere else
I was expecting a cross-over but not so soon. I enjoyed ENISA in ASC but she gotta step it up if wants to go to ESC.
Represent “them”? Sounds rough
I think she was probably meaning the broadcaster, not the country or the people.
But you represent your country, not broadcastet
? Im not following you guys. What’s the big deal here?
Like, she doesn’t identify herself as part of this country, so why does she want to represent it