Spain’s RTVE has appointed a new direction for Benidorm Fest 2024, with Ana María Bordas and César Vallejo as contest directors and there will be a 10 member expert committee. Eva Mora has been sacked as Head of Delegation.
Let’s take it step by step. First of all, Eva Mora will no longer be the Head of the Spanish Delegation. She held that position in 2022 and, according to RTVE, shared it with Ana María Bordas in 2023. According to Vertele, she has been offered a job in RTVE’s Entertainment division, away from Eurovision.
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Mora has been linked to the contest since 2012. Between that year and 2021, she was reporting about the contest for RTVE’s News division. In August 2021, she was signed as HoD.
Bordas, who is part of the Reference Group, will now take the Head of Delegation job on her own. She previously held that position between 2019 and 2021, and was co-HoD in 2017 and 2018 with Antonio Losada.
As you’ll remember those weren’t exactly the golden years of Spain, as the country came 26th (2017), 23rd (2018), 22nd (2019) and 24th (2021).
There’s a difference now, as Bordas is now also Head of Entertainment, a position previously held by Toñi Prieto, who was often accused of sabotaging Spanish entries at Eurovision.
Okay, all clear? Now let’s get to Benidorm
Benidorm Fest 2024: New direction committee
A week ago, Spain opened submissions for Benidorm Fest 2024. Now RTVE has confirmed there will be a direction of its own for the contest, as for the last two years it was the delegation who ruled over it.
Now, Ana María Bordas and César Vallejo will co-direct Spain’s national selection. César has been working at Eurovision in RTVE for almost 10 years. In 2017, he was behind Objetivo Eurovisión’s Eurocasting, the drama free online preview of the overdramatic 2017 national selection.
Recently, he was also the director of La Pichoneta, a side show for Eurovision 2023 which you’ll probably remember because Käärijä talked about his penis on it. Wild, I know.
Käärijä intenta imitar la voz del cantante de Rammstein al principio de su actuación en #Eurovisión2023 #Pichoneta #Liverpoolcalling #Eurovision https://t.co/4gSvO6dDRv pic.twitter.com/4eMxxrvsnb
— Eurovisión RTVE (@eurovision_tve) May 12, 2023
What else? There’s someone you will remember who’ll be involved in 2024. Rayden, who came fourth at Benidorm Fest 2022, will be one of the musical assistants of the show.
Aside from Bordas and Vallejo, there will be an expert committee in charge of the Benidorm Fest song selection and three musical assistants. Those are Rayden, Tony Sánchez Ohlsson and Pablo Cebrián.
Joining them five in the committee will be Eurovision comentator and Los 40 radio DJ Tony Aguilar, Radio 3 host Virginia Díaz, choreographer Myriam Benedited and RTVE’s Head of Content and Head of Communication, José Pablo López and María Eizaguirre.
You’ll remember María Eizaguirre, also known as MEC, from the countless press conferences held at Benidorm Fest. Next year, she’ll be in charge again of the contest’s communication and events.
And that’s a wrap on Spain’s changes for Eurovision 2024. How do you think they’ll impact in Benidorm Fest? Are you sad to see Eva Mora go? What’s good, what’s bad? Sound off in the comment section below!
Tip for Spain next year: SEND VICCO – her song is MASSIVE, accumulating some of the highest views on her Benidorm fest final video and the original music video has 18 million views!! Vicco would have performed her heart out in the Eurovision final and given Spain a GREAT televoting score that COULD have put them in the top five again!
Vicco was poor live vocally. Song is a smash hit, her performance wasnt….
I actually went back to her Benidorm Fest final performance and was pleasantly surprised about how hood her vocals were. I remembered them being breathy and her struggling at certain points but it didn’t seem to be so much the case. I think it’s because, this year at Eurovision and the pre-parties, so many more struggled and did worse so now her actual performance seems even better! And this was months ago so think about how she could have enhanced it for Eurovision. I have seen Vicco do acoustic versions of the song as well as she genuinely had a… Read more »
I’m really sad to see Eva Mora go. She had something magical. I wish the new team the best, I’m not sure bringing back the old gang is a good idea.
What? But Spain was doing so well under her direction. All I can say is good luck, Spain, You’re gonna need it next year
Who cares? The Spanish fans will always prop up their entry as if it were the second coming, and trash all the other ones. Not much will change, really. It’s all surface level stuff.
Your comment is very unpleasant for a country. What’s wrong with you?
The problem in Spain for many years was very simple. The people in charge are not cool and dont have taste. Nothing against Ana but she does not have taste in any way. Eva mora is cool and knows what is popular nowadays, every single song that has been performed in both benidorm editions are miles and miles ahead of any song Spain had under Ana
Ciao bella!
This just proves that TVE don’t want to win or get good results in ESC
Please explain to me if I’m missing something, but it seems to me people are being a bit overreactive in predicting this is a return to the late 2010s Spain bottom just because of the HoD. The BF is already in place now, and it’s not like she’s selecting the entry on her own. If anything, I’m more worried about the new BF rules that will deter more established or promising artists, since all participants have to give up their songs rights to RTVE among other compromises. Before it was only the winner, or so I understood
They have to give up the song rights? Cannot imagine artists and their record labels do that.
My bad, I read it again and it says “image, name, voice, and any materials submitted for their participation” can be used by RTVE free of charge (which is not the song, given what it says for the winner below). It is the sole owner of exploitation rights over the recordings, such as the BF performance videos, as before I think. Youtube revenues seem shared 50-50.
There is also this: “cesión de derechos editoriales de la Canción, en las condiciones y porcentaje que se acuerden con la Editora de la Corporación RTVE” but only for the winner.
Sad to see this happen, especially with Benidorm fest becoming more popular and respected as a nf within the esc bubble.
I’ve heard some Spanish fans suggest that this change might be a result of internal conflicts rather than results (because going this drastic after one right hand side finish which imo was undeserved seems a bit ott). I’m worried because weve all seen clear improvements in Spain’s selection process and also the qualitquality of entries they sent. With this former HoD in charge, I do worry Spain will return to their late 2010s era.
Goodbye, Tina Turner. What a star you are and always will be.
Yes, this is related to the contest, because Buck Fizz were the first to record What’s Love Got To Do With It, Bonnie Tyler first performed The Best, and Celine Dion once recorded River Deep Mountain High.
Of course. Huge music stars have influenced many Eurovision acts (or the other way round, sometimes). Some time ago, a musician friend of mine was watching France’s 2013 entry “L’Enfer et Moi” by Amandine Bourgeois and found some Tina Turner’s influences on her.
So Rayden is remaining involved in music at a different level. He’s currently in the middle of what will be his retirement tour as a performer, as he has begun to transition into a writing career. His first book, El acercamiento de la mujer cactus y el hombre globo, was published back in January, while his final album, La victoria imposible (which includes his BeFest ’22 song), came out last month.
Objectivo Eurovisión 2017 Manel Navarros results: Jury: 1st Phone: 4th SMS: 3rd App: 3rd Overall votes: 3rd Jury votes: 1st Manel Navarro, points: 34 2nd Mario Jefferson, points: 25 3rd* Mirela, points 22 3rd* LeKlein, points 22 4th Paula Rojo, points 21 5th Maika, points 20 Overall votes from phone, SMS & app: 1st Mirela: 4 479 votes = 36 points 2nd LeKlein: 2 712 votes = 30 points 3rd Manel Navarro: 2 109 votes = 24 points 4th Maika: 1 817 votes = 21 5th Paula Rojo: 935 votes = 18 6th Mario Jefferson: 535 votes = 15 Final… Read more »
Anyone who has anything to do with that embarrasment of an entry in 2017 should be nowhere near anything having to do with choosing an entry for Spain
Epic voice crack moment!
Was that the repeat do it for my lover song. Awful entry if it is.
Yep, it was. Well deserved last placer.
I don’t understand them, honestly…Paloma did a very good job and the result is decent.
Spain did a lot worse in the past and they choose to forget it…Every year it can’t be a SloMo. Eva Mora give Benidorm Fest a very good direction and it’s very wrong that they change her..
Time for Spain to be the joke of Eurovision again. It sucks how SloMo is my country’s best result in this century.
Why? People loved it and the stage performance was fantastic and its influence was felt this year by all the dance breaks by so many countries. You cant send the same song every year i know but it was a million times better than EAEAEAEA AHHHHHHHHHH
I dont understand why you view Slo mo negatively, it was a great entry. My personal winner of this years contest was Spain but I still had Spain top 3 last year.
If you saw the damage music like Slomo and people like Chanel have done to Spain, you’d understand why.
Who will represent Spain next year ?
By the way Wiwibloggs should continue the ”wishlist for the next year” articles , they did not post any of them last summer.
I love these wishlists too! BH may never return, but thanks to the wishlists I discovered Božo Vre?o.
This is not a good vibe I’m afraid. Eva is the best thing that has happened to us in the last few years. A serious and hardworking person who speaks about Eurovision with so much love and passion, she even cried once during an interview talking about how much it would mean to her to win the contest with Spain … but now we are once again getting some questionable choices. Nothing good lasts, at least not in RTVE.
We should never forget that RTVE, as an organization, is terribly corrupted. The questionable choices can always be explained with: is this the friend of a politician, or the friend of a friend, or can this person be used to hide other terrible choices? It’s always the same corruption loop.
Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. End of the story. But as far I know, Benidorm Fest still has to be considered a massive success story. I don’t see any reason to change anything at all.
I thought Spain was eager to win in the next years, so they seem to have given up that idea..?
Thanks Luis for positioning the events for everyone to understand what it all means.
They have no clue what they are doing either way so names doesnt matter
All this really won’t change anything, as long as they don’t choose the right song and the jury will continue to follow the Spanish fans and their delusional choices every year anew with the most bizarre and indigestible song possible in the competition, like this year with Eeae, who if it weren’t for the jurors in the final would have taken the last place instead of Germany . The only time it worked for them and almost brought them a victory if not for the invasion of Ukraine, was last year with Chanel, And it was not because of the… Read more »
The. contest has only been held twice. Don’t be so quick to judge!
EaEa will be remembered much more fondly in years to come than many of the entries that finished above it on the night, the results are not conclusive at all but they are taken at face value by misguided vindictive people…
Give it up 5pts from the public for eaeaeaahhhhhhh. By the way has it charted anywhere across Europe like many of the other songs above it have! enough said.
The charts are for boring normies, that was never the song’s purpose in the first place.
Its not the most streaming friendly song, that doesn’t define the quality of the entry however, beautifully sung, great performance, striking staging, it deserved a lot more from both jurors and televoters.
Bizarre. Ana Maria Bordas oversaw a terrible period of Spanish participation at Eurovision (anyone involved in the 2017 fiasco should not be allowed to work in any sort of selection process ever again imo), dropped the role for one year where Spain achieved their best result in like forever, then came back and shared the role with the person who oversaw said best result in forever and managed to take an ESC favourite and underperform in terms of result. I wish I could have career results like Ana Maria Bordas and still continue to work. The only other place I… Read more »
The number of points Blanca Paloma got has three digits, and it could be just one. Spain forgot how bad they were at Eurovision in past.
Oh come on. She was last by phone. God…!
The most decent person they had, out. You have to laugh
I first heard about this decision through ESC Samuel and I was horrified. Why would they make such a dramatic change so quickly? I won’t be surprised if the great Benidorm Fest doesn’t exist in the next few years!
The inclusion of Rayden DOES sweeten the deal a bit!
How do we know that Eva Mora has been “sacked”? Maybe she was just reassigned to a different department, one with good career opportunities. Maybe she’s pleased with her promotion.
Correct. The article simply states she’s been offered a job elsewhere. Although there is a likelihood this is not a “promotion” (generally, you don’t get one after an “underperformance” lol), it’s not necessarily a negative move.
Based on Spain’s previous efforts/results and those achieved by her, I’m sure there’s a good chance she’ll be successful in her next role, too.
No the article literally says “sacked”
People have been talking for months now about her bad relationship with María Eizaguirre so, I guess she was invited to leave at some point.
Most of the people working at TVE at these levels are public employees so to be fired they really need to mess things up a lot, like committing crimes level. She was probably sent to another department with no relation to Eurovision much to our dismay.
Love the shade in the article 😉
I don’t get this decision. Is it internal politics? Eva has done a great job so far, why change someone who’s loved by the fanbase and has received positive feedback for the way she’s handling the project called Eurovision?
The only part I like about this piece of news is the inclusion of Rayden!
I don’t dislike Rayden but I’m suspicious of the fact that he quit music earlier this year because he felt it wasn’t a fair industry and now he’s joining the industry himself? I hope he works to make it fairer in some way.
This seems like such a knee-jerk reaction. Blanca came 17th, not 25th! It’s still Spain’s second best result since Ruth Lorenzo in 2014
And in all of the other years since Ruth, they never made it out of the bottom 5/6 (except for Chanel).
26th Televote… Mi teoría
I can already smell the drama ?
Can’t we just beg Chanel to come back?
No.
Okay, maybe after the next cycle of a decade of misery is completed…
Absolutely NOT!
Yes, please. But they prefer being bitton ever.
Remember all the bullying that they made to her and she was 3rd hahaha, they can’t resist that great result by Chanel .
The worst enemy of Spain in ESC are the Spaniards.
Just as they were getting good? Meh.
Huge mistake.