It’s the national final that ended the United Kingdom’s five-year experiment with internal selection. Now the BBC has confirmed that Eurovision: You Decide will be held on Friday 27 January — in just seven weeks’ time.
The 2017 date comes a month earlier than the 2016 date, which was held on 26 February 2016. The earlier date would give the UK more time to prepare the winning entry for Kyiv. Fans have previously criticised UK Eurovision entries for having under developed staging concepts.
Eurovision: You Decide will be held at the Eventim Hammersmith Apollo — also the location for the 2015 special Eurovision’s Greatest Hits. This is a change from the 2016 venue, the smaller O2 Forum.
Another change for 2017 will be the broadcast network. The 2016 show was broadcast on BBC Four, a channel known for highbrow arts programming. In 2017 it will move to BBC Two, a more popular channel with mainstream music coverage. Eurovision: You Decide will be broadcast from 7.30pm to 9:00pm.
Ticket prices for the 2017 show are also down from 2016. Tickets for standing areas are £34.25, while seated areas are £37.00. Last year, tickets set back fans £45.00.
The show will again again involve six performers who will compete to represent the UK in Kyiv. The songs will again first be revealed on 23 January on The Ken Bruce Show on BBC Radio 2 – four days before the grand final.
Also returning for 2017 is the show’s host, former Great British Bake Off presenter and Eurovision semi-final commentator Mel Giedroyc. She’ll be joined by an expert panel who’ll sound off about the acts.
Earlier in the year, the BBC held a public song submission period. The shortlisted songs will join those sought from professional songwriters, under the guidance of music executive Hugh Goldsmith. The British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors (BASCA) will again select a song from its members.
Last year’s winner of Eurovision: You Decide was former The Voice singers Joe and Jake. While their song “You’re Not Alone” only placed 24th in Stockholm, fans were encouraged with the BBC’s new attitude towards the selection of their Eurovision entry.
What do you think? Who would you like to see at Eurovision: You Decide next year? Share your thoughts below!
I reckon they should introduce internet voting for ESC fans outside the UK and there should be more songs or a semi finals round.
And I still ask myself after all these years … UK in Eurovision …. what for? Pretty sure I’ll be asking the same thing in 2018 …
@Alex: I don’t see the issue of this show not being on BBC One. The fact that it is moving up from BBC4 should already be seen as an improvement. If the turn out is better than what the channel would be expecting, maybe a chance to get onto the mothership would be in the cards, like what happened wit Bake Off.
It would be fun if UK had semifinals. Maybe each country of U.K to hold a final and the winners proceed to the big finale. That would be a fair way to include all.
The interest for ESC isn’t that high yet, but it could be a way to increase interest in the contest. That’s what I think the BBC needs to do, keep the interest up.
Ouiouibloggs…….haha !!
why is it so hard to do it on BBC1? give it a prime time slot, engage the people with the show. Make the voting exciting and accessible to everyone.
They could’ve done semifinals in other regions but that would be too much for BBC. People are not interested i guess.
Find modern songs, more pop songs please.
Invite international acts, make the show exciting and interesting. Promote it on BBC days before the final. Release the song on iTunes and Spotify. Actually, they should have presented the songs 1 week ago and not 3 days.
@Purple Mask: Having re-read my comment, I apologise if it sounded a bit aggressive – I was just confused about where you got that from.
@Robyn: ITV had JESC.
@Paul: I think the issue there would be cost, although it’d probably be better to move the final to different cities each year rather than keep it in London.
@MoreMusicLessGlamourPlease: OGAE UK only selected one song (Miracle), the BASCA selected (A Better Man), and Hugh Goldsmith’s team chose the other four.
My ticket is confirmed. I will be going to the Hammersmith Apollo! 🙂
I’m kind of encouraged by this – promotion to a better channel, a significantly superior venue with a much bigger stage. I expect the January date is down to the availability of the venue, but maybe it will give them time to follow the lead of other countries and remaster the song, maybe even promote it (I know, I shouldn’t get my hopes up too high). The problem with the BBC has been a lack of consistency in the way it has chosen songs, they need to stick with this format and grow it organically, this year is slightly bigger,… Read more »
I went to last years selection and it was good fun! I do worry if they’ll be able to fill Hammersmith apollo though (it wasn’t exactly rammed last year).
I think it would be good to have semi finals around the rest of the country – would get more people engaged maybe…
I also love the idea of different genre semi finals to get a more diverse offering!
@Kris: Or it could be as in the French (Oui, Oui). N’est-ce pas? 🙂
@Robyn: Thanks for clarifying that. (As you can tell, I haven’t been a fan of the BBC’s “interest” or “stake” in Eurovision for quite some time. Having said that, I am looking forward to next month’s event at the Hammersmith Apollo.)
@Purple Mask
One of my friends came up with the thought that ‘wivibloggs’ would have incorporated both William’s name and euroVision while having the same ring to it………and William is too witty and spontaneous to have not thought of that……so methinks there must be some reasoning to have a 2nd wi instead of a vi!!That’s why I asked if there was any truth to my reasoning!!
Only 6 songs again? Let’s hope the committee is better at choosing this time around… less generic songwriting please.
I predict that UK will come Top 24!!!!! BBC2, that says it all- not even a prime time Saturday night slot on BBC1!!! Forget it, we will never get in the top half with the BBc not wanting to win and putting a half heart effort to try and show the gullible ones of ius that they (pretend) to care when we know that they dont!
Something tells me that the rescheduling of this contest to a month earlier will do little good. From what I have seen, over the last 4 ESC contests that I have watched, is that songs that are selected or presented in February and March do very well, while songs selected/presented in November, December and in some cases January do poorly. The U.K. hasn’t had a decent showing since Blue’s “I Can” finished 11th in 2011. You would think by now they would try it the MF way, by holding a couple of semis and have a final. I gather that… Read more »
I hope they can rustle up a good song with a decent chance. All I ask for is something with a bit of personality – I’d rather a bad song that stood out over sheer mediocrity. Joe & Jake were nice guys, but the song was dull. I live in hope! Also, Mel Giedroyc is great, so leave her alone.
Standing tickets is a mistake too, I think. It looks awful to see a bunch of sweaty yelling men crushed up heckling and drunk. Why not fully seated?
@Kris: Good question. Maybe there were two William Lee Adamses? Or it’s just a crude bit of marketing? 😀
@mad-professor: Admittedly I was referring to past articles and conversations on this website about Simon Cowell’s interest in Eurovision, so my statement about the BBC may now be out of date – apologies if that is the case.
If I could choose….like Sean Dunphy, this would be my “dream scenario” for how UK picked their ESC-song! UK has such a rich flourishing music scene…also on the indie / atlernative / amaetur cucuit. Maybe Adele, Coldplay etc are too big, too busy, and down’t need ESC to achieve morefame…But stll, try something fresh. What about a series of semifinals, for different music style. Let’s think: 1 semi with rock, 1 with indie / alternative, 1 with mainstream radio pop, 1 with rnb, 1 with coutry…..and so on. Let’s say 6 to 10 songs in each semi. And then the… Read more »
@Mad…. – Sorry I wrote wrong! 🙂 What I really meant to say was: I am against the idea of ESC-fans picking songs fr the final. They did that in UK last year. And the songs were mostly quite dll, unoriginal songs in ESC-terms….I am afriad that easily can happen. i don’t think they would go for something really “alternative”, like say “Mightnight Gold”. Which rihtfully got the 12 from the UK ury this year! Of course, many ESC fans will vote, and be part in deciding the winner. But ater all, most people who vote are “usual random people”.… Read more »
@Dennis
You can’t really bring Sweden into that argument, they need a Eurovision performance ready for February then three months from their semi-final to fine tune it. And I think timing does count, look at Malta and Georgia in 2015, both were revamped after being picked in November and early January respectively and both new versions were massive improvements on the originals.
This is encouraging, prime time major network, not BBC 1, but getting there. Hopefully the date change won’t affect the acts preparing for January! Can’t wait to hear. Surely “the only way is up!”
I have a trivial doubt guys…….what does the second ‘wi’ in wiwibloggs stand for?
What’s the date got to do with everything? Sounds like a bad excuse. It doesn’t matter if you have final in November or March, you should be able to send a good song with good staging. Albania have their final first of all in December and still failed to qualify to the final even though they had the most time of all countries to prepare. And Sweden holds their final last of all, in late March, yet always ends up in top 5.. Despite only having like two months to prepare. Focus on finding good songs and equally good staging… Read more »
I don’t want to gamble when it comes to UK because every year, their entries are always so-so to bad. Though I am interested in knowing much about the participating artists and their songs so that’s just only it.
It doesnt matter if they choose their song in May or September or January 22nd @ 8.39pm – they need to stop sending crap songs and send something decent. Simple as that.
I hope there are better songs next year
@MoreMusicLessGlamourPlease
Of course fans will select the song – what’s the point of having a National Final if they didn’t? Also, Mel was previously the presenter of one of the most popular shows in Britain and is the co-host of the semi-finals in the UK.
Hoping for more diversity than middle-of-the-road, mid-tempo songs with the odd ballad thrown in. But great to see the BBC putting more effort into the national selection, might even go myself 🙂
Fans will select the songs….and same presenter as last year. Two reasons to be very sceptical!
Cool changes. Hopefully it’ll translate to unique song selections.
The big benefit of the Apollo, as Eurovision’s Greatest Hits showed, is there is a lot more space for staging. Not sure on it still being 90 minutes – even though it was the only NF last year to actually run on schedule, it felt like it could have been a bit longer.
@Purple Mask
‘The BBC needs to make this kind of effort, otherwise it was in danger of losing Eurovision to ITV. It was that bad.’
No, it really wasn’t. What?
The BBC needs to make this kind of effort, otherwise it was in danger of losing Eurovision to ITV. It was that bad.
I love the Hammersmith Apollo, much better sound than the O2 Forum.
Let’s see what acts the UK selection has to offer.
Last year they had a tragic selection of songs. Hopefully 2017 will bring them more luck.
UK choosing early dose this mean a lot of promotion behined the song for Ukraine?
i’m quite confident UK will do better next year. can’t watch to watch mel. she’s histerical.
I have faith in the BBC this year.
To be honest, last year’s UK final, their first since 2008 was a real dissappointment for me! The only song I TRULY liked was the Country-ish song. And the winner maybe (I know many people also like the song by Jessica, but it kind of left me cold). Considering the “world power” status UK has when it comes to pop and rock….it was really disappointing. I dare say it was the worst NF last year. Esp. considering the possible material. I always dislike it when Swedish songwriters start to “invade” other countries. And seriously, UK with such a huge home… Read more »
The question marks was actually an Emoji but I guess it didn’t like it
Yay ????
Yey! I hope the BBC will manage to get strong competing acts for next year. I like all but 1 of the finalists who took part last year.