According to the Romanian newspaper Adevarul, the cities that will host the two semi final rounds of Selectia Nationala 2019, the country’s national selection format, will be Arad and Iasi.
City of Arad last week confimred that it will be hosting the national selection semi final while Iasi during the weekend approved the budget to host the semi final event. Polivalenta Hall, the Town hall and the city council of Iasi, will spend a total of 49.000 euro which are necessary for the financial support of hosting Selectia Nationala 2019.
According to local media reports the two semi final rounds are set to take place on 20 and 27 January 2019. From each semi final a national jury panel will select up to five entries to qualify to the final while the public voting will determine one more spot. However the national broadcaster maintains the right to pick one from those acts that didn’t make it to the final.
During the final, which will take place in February, the national jury will be replaced by an international jury which alongside with the televoting will determine the winner of the national final.In case of a tie the national jury will decide who will be the winner.
THE NATIONAL SELECTION PROCESS UP TO DATE
Earlier TVR has received 126 potential entries for the national selection, as the online submission deadline closed on December 10th. Notable the impressive number of submissions, which is 70% higher than last year’s national selection.
Under this year’s moto Împlinește visul! ( Make the dream come true!), a professional jury of music directors, radio and television broadcasters, plus other music professionals, will judge the 126 entries and decide which songs will compete in the Selecția Națională 2019 semi-finals.The professional jury will select up to 24 entries to compete in the semi-finals, which have been reduced to two shows, which means that 12 acts will take to the stage in each semi.
The Eurovision Story So Far
Romania made its first attempt to compete in the contest back in 1993 for the Eurovision Song Contest. After competing in the preliminary semi-final in Slovenia with Dida Dragan, failed to win one of the three spots that led to the Eurovision stage in Millstreet, Ireland .
The country officially debuted at the the Eurovision Song Contest in 1994 with Dan Bitman and has participatted a total of 22 times since then. Its best reuslts were scored in 2005 with Luminita Anghel and in 2010 with the duo Paula Seling & Ovi achieving in both cases the honorable 3rd place in the Grand Final. In 2016 the country received a penalty by the EBU due to its broadcaster’s overdue debt and was forced to withdraw from the contest, although it had chosen its Eurovision entry and act for Stockholm.
This year the Romanian band The Humans won the Selecţia Naţională and performed Goodbye on the stage of Altice Arena in Lisbon. For the first time in its history the country didn’t make it to the final, breaking a record of qualifying to each grand final since the semi finals were introduced.
