BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

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Belarus: detailed information on the "flexible" Eurofest [exclusive]

Fotis Konstantopoulos reporting from Athens (Greece)

The Belarusian selection is only hours away. But secure sources informed oikotimes.com exclusively on what will happen tomorrow. The main idea of the Belarusian broadcaster is actually to select the performers rather than the song. While the BTRC rules are writen in a flexible way it is clear that the teo or three winners will not enter the final selection for Helsinki with the songs which we will hear tomorrow. This is how the procedure will work:

on the winners number

Tomorrow there will be two winners from the televoting. The jury will also vote for one more winner. If that winner is included in the televoting winners, then in January the internal selection will take place among two artists. If the jury winner will not have been selected by the public then a third person will be added to the final stage of selection. This is something that BTRC does since participating in the contest.

the songs for Eurovision

In a more fair way BTRC will announce either tomorrow or on Monday that the broadcaster invites the winners (two or three) to submit alternative songs - solutions for the Eurovision Song Contest bidding. The performance of those songs will be made internally on late January. This is something that was done in 2005 as well this is why the 2005 representative got the freedom to alter her song. Stay tuned tomorrow for full coverage of the selection.

Belarus Today reports

Semi-finalists of the 'Eurofest' TV contest have been announced at the press conference on 5 December in Minsk. Among them are two Russian singers Diana Gurtskaya, Natalya Lapteva, and Ukrainian Irina Yarina. Most contenders selected by the jury to participate in the semi-final concert are from Minsk: bands 'Borneo', 'New Generation', 'the Project', 'Dali', 'Litesound', singers Dmitry Koldun, Lena (Elena Voloshina), Victor Pshenichniy, Natalya Tamelo, Oleg Karpenko, Anya Sharkunova. Music band 'Svayaki' from Gomel also got through to the semi-final.

There were 66 applications submitted altogether, but only 56 singers turned up for the audition. 'Eurofest' Project Director Alexander Tikhanovich said that there were not any applications from such professional performers as Inna Afanasieva, Irina Dorofeyeva, Pyotr Elfimov although they were approached. On the other hand, he said that "the audition opened up new names". He added that the main criteria for the jury were "live performance and pure intonations". Project Arts Director Vasily Rainchik noted that "the main idea has worked this year - selecting singers on the platform". He also said that "the number of applications has gone down greatly, but performance standards were much higher". He said that despite the fact that all performances were of different genres with "peculiar ways of presentations", there were not any 'monsters' as it was with the last year's 'Eurovision' prize winners.

Singers Alexander Patlis, Ulyalyum, and Georgiy Koldun also submitted their applications but did not make it to the semi-final due to various reasons. Angelika Agurbash was also going to participate but the song she submitted did not meet the contest regulations because it was performed in public before 1 October 2006. Alexander Tikhanovich said that gala concert for the 15 participants of the 'Eurovision-2007' selection contest will be taking place on 15 December in the Big Hall of the Palace of the Republic in conditions as much approximated to the real 'Eurovision' as possible. For instance, performers will be singing live, and their presentations will include short personal introductions. The concert is to be covered by the First National TV Channel.

The professional jury and viewers will select two or three best singers. Two will be selected by the jury, and a third by TV viewers. In case the jury and viewers' choices coincide, only two participants will go through to the final. The jury will not be present in the hall but will stay in a studio with TV screens. "We need to see what singers look like on the screen, as 'Eurovision' is a TV contest," explained Alexander Tikhanivich. Vasily Rainchik added that running the selection by the new rules (live performance rather than backing track) had a great effect on the quality of the music presented to the jury. "Now it's about voices, not backing tracks," he said. Moreover, many artists this time use certain music arrangements making their music more nationally recognisable.

Source:

http://www.oikotimes.com/site/index.php?id=7253