The national broadcaster of FYR Macedonia has called on artists to submit their songs for Skopje Fest 2015, which was used as the country’s national selection process for Eurovision last year.

Submissions can be made by September 15. Songs must be no longer than four minutes, must be in Macedonian and cannot have been released prior to the music festival. According to the regulations foreign artists and composers are acceptable in the festival.

Skopje Fest will take place in November, with an exact date yet to be announced.The Skopje Fest victor will  win a cash prize of 9.800 euros. Second placed artists will have to settle for a prize of 7.350 euros while third place gets 4.900 euros. In addition to this prizes the first place might lead to the next Eurovision song Contest if the country decided to compete in Stockholm next year.

THE STORY SO FAR

Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, officially debuted at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1998. However, the country had already made efforts to enter the contest two years before since the Eurovision Song Contest 1996’s pre-selection round where it submitted its first song entry, “Samo ti” sung by Kaliopi, which failed to qualify to the final thus eliminating the nation from competing for the first time.

Macedonian Radio-Television (MRT), which broadcasts the event, has used the Skopje Fest festival to select the national entry since the country’s debut, although it made several changes in the national final format, so the 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2012 national finals were organised outside the Skopje Festival.

The country’s best result was in 2006, when Elena Risteska sang “Ninanajna” in Athens, Greece and came 12th.

Last year the winner of Skopje fest 2014 was Daniel Kajmakoski with his song “Autumn Leaves” and represented the country in Vienna at the 60th Eurovision Song Contest, but didn’t manage to qualify to the grand final ending up at 15th place in the first semi final.