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The official rules of the Eurovision Song Contest are long, technical, and ever-changing. Many of the rules cover technical aspects
of the television broadcast itself. However, a few of the more important rules affecting the conduct and outcome of the Contest
follow.
Contents
Number of songs
No previously published music
Voices and instruments
Performers
Languages
Dialects and regional languages notes per year
Language issues and English-language prevalence
Rule changes by year
See also
References
Number of songs
Each country in the Eurovision Song Contest is entitled to enter just one song. The contest final is limited to 26 songs, apart from in
2015 when 27 countries took part following what was initially meant to be a one-off invite to Australia. Since 2016, Australia have
competed in the semi-finals. They consist of the following:
The "Big 5" countries (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the United Kingdom), as they are the five largest
economic contributors to the contest, are rewarded with automatic spots in the final.
The host country.
10 qualifiers from Semi-final 1 - held on the T
uesday before the contest.
10 qualifiers from Semi-final 2 - held on the Thursday before the contest.
At the first Contest, each country was allowed to submit two songs each with a maximum duration of three minutes. Nowadays, it is
still required that each song not exceed three minutes in length, although many artists record the song in a longer version, simply
performing a shorter version at the Contest. The number of participating countries has grown throughout the Contest's history, and
since 1993 the rules have been changed several times to both limit the number of finalists and to allow for participation by former
Soviet and Yugoslav republics, Warsaw Pact nations and others.
Performers
Current rules state that countries are allowed to have up to six performers on stage. Performers must be aged 16 or older, on the day
of the semi-final in the year of the Contest.[1] This rule was introduced in1990, as two contestants the year before had been 1 and 12
years old. The introduction of this rule means that Sandra Kim, who was 13 when she won for Belgium in 1986, will remain the
youngest winner unless the age limit is lowered. No restriction on the nationality of the performers exists, which has resulted in
countries being represented by artists who are not nationals of that country. One of the most well-known winning artists was
Canadian Céline Dion who represented Switzerland in 1988. It should also be noted that the performer only needs to be 16 when the
event takes place and not when they are selected, as proven when Lindsay Dracass was selected to represent the United Kingdom in
2001 and again when Triinu Kivilaan was selected to represent Switzerland in 2005, despite both of these performers only being 15 at
visa to enable her to travel to Copenhagen.[2]
their respective times of selection. In Dracass' case, she had to be issued a special
Languages
From the first Contest in 1956 until 1965, and again from 1973 until 1976 there was no restriction on language. From 1966 until
1972, and again from 1978 until 1998, songs were required to be performed in a national language. The national language rule was
actually instituted shortly before the 1977 Contest, but some countries had already selected non-national language entries, and they
were allowed to enter without any changes.
As of the 1999 Contest, the restriction was again lifted, and songs may be performed in any language. As a result, many of the songs
are performed partially or completely in English. In 2003, Belgium made full use of the so-termed free language rule, and entered a
song, "Sanomi", in an artificial language created especially for the song. This proved successful as the country finished second, only
two points behind Turkey. The same tactic was used in 2006 by the Dutch entry Treble which is partially sung in an artificial
language and once again by Belgium with their 2008 entry "O Julissi".
1971, 1996, 2003 & 2012 - Austria sang in various dialects ofGerman (Viennese in 1971, Vorarlbergisch in 1996,
Styrian in 2003 and Mühlviertel dialect in 2012)
1972 – Ireland sang in Irish, one of the two official languages of Ireland
1980 – The title of Norway's entry was in Sami language
1982 – Germany sang in German but after winning performed the reprise in five dif ferent languages: German,
English, French, Italian and Dutch
1989 – Switzerland sang in Romansh, the fourth language ofSwitzerland
1990 and 2012 – Finland sang in Swedish, which is the country's second official language.
1991 – Italy sang in Neapolitan, an Italo-Dalmatian language spoken inNaples and surrounding areas.
1992, 1993, 1996 and 2011 – France sang in the languages ofAntillean Creole (1992), Corsican (1993 and 2011)
and Breton (1996).
1999 – Lithuania sang in Samogitian, a dialect of Lithuanian
2004 – Estonia sang in Võro, which is considered by some to be a dialect ofEstonian, and others, a separate
language
2003, 2006 and 2008 – In 2003, Belgium's Urban Trad sang "Sanomi" in a completely made-up language, while the
Dutch participants in 2006,Treble, sang half of their song "Amambanda" in a fictional language. In 2008,
Ishtar
performed their song, "O Julissi" in a fictional language as well.
2006 - Monaco sang partially in Tahitian.
2009 - The Czech Republic sang partially in Romani, the language of the Romani people.
2009 - Israel sang partially in Hebrew and in Arabic.
2011 - Norway introduces lyrics in Swahili. The entry from France was performed in Corsican that same year.
2012 - Most of the lyrics of Russia's entry were in the Udmurt language (which, alongside Russian, is the official
language in Udmurtia).
2016 - Ukraine decided to sendJamala, a Crimean singer, with her song "1944" which featured lyrics in theCrimean
Tatar language, which sparked controversy between Russia and Ukraine because of the Annexation of Crimea by
the Russian Federation.
2016 - The same year Greece sent Argo with a song in Pontic Greek. Only the refrain of the song was in English.
In some cases, the lyrics are written and recorded in two different versions (usually English and a national language) or a single
multi-language version. Examples include:
Denmark, where the national selection procedure allows freedom of language, but if the winning song from their
national competition is inDanish, it must be re-written in English for the competition.
Sweden, even as there is no outspoken rule the song must be translated into English, it has usually been done so (if
allowed in the rules), as in 1965, 1973, 1974, 1975, 1999, 2000, 2004, and 2006.
Macedonia, who held a vote to decide whether their 2005 song should be in English or Macedonian.
France, whose entry in2001 was performed partially inFrench and partially in English. The2007 entry was sung in
Franglais. The French entry in 2008 caused controversy as it was all inEnglish and people were unhappy about
being represented with an English song. In 2012,Anggun performed her song Echo partly in English but mostly in
French. The same happened in 2016, whenAmir performed the chorus of his song "J'ai cherché" in English and the
rest of the song in French. In 2017,Alma performs her song "Requiem" partly in English, but mostly in French as
well.
Albania, only allows songs performed in Albanian at "Festival i Këngës", their pre-selection round for the Contest.
Afterwards, they translate the lyrics of their entrant ot English, just for the contest, as done in
2014, 2015, 2016 and
2017 .
2016 A new voting system is introduced. Entries now receive one set of points from the jury and one set of points
from televoting. First, the jury votes are given in the usual way , giving 1 up to 12 points but with only the 12th being
read by the spokesperson. Then, the televotes are read by the presenters, starting with the country receiving the
least televotes and ending with the country that received the most televotes, so the winner is not known until the end
of the show.[9] In addition, the number of countries competing in the final is reduced back to 26 as Australia now
competes in the semi-final.[10]
See also
Voting at the Eurovision Song Contest
References
1. "Rules of the 2005 Eurovision Song Contest"(https://web.archive.org/web/20060210010517/http://www .eurovision.t
v/searchfiles_english/574.htm). Eurovision.tv (EBU). 2005. Archived from the original (http://www.eurovision.tv/searc
hfiles_english/574.htm)on 2006-02-10. Retrieved 2008-08-17.
2. Terry Wogan, Eurovision Song Contest 2001
3. Ivković, D. (2013). The Eurovision Song Contest on oYuTube: A corpus-based analysis of language attitudes.
Language@Internet, 10, article 1. u
( rn:nbn:de:0009-7-35977)
4. http://www.open.edu/openlearn/languages/english-language/language-variety-all-disappears-the-eurovision-song-
contest
5. http://www.eurovision.am/eng/?sub=history
6. http://www.eurovision.tv/page/history/by-year/contest?event=287
7. "Eurovision Song Contest invites Australia to join 'world's biggest party
' " (https://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/f
eb/10/eurovision-song-contest-invites-australia-to-join-worlds-biggest-party) . The Guardian. 11 February 2015.
Retrieved 10 February 2015.
8. "Australia participate in the 60th Eurovision"(http://www.eurovision.tv/page/news?id=australia_to_participate_in_the
_2015_eurovision_song_contest). Eurovision.tv. EBU. 11 February 2015. Retrieved 10 February 2015.
9. SVT Article, 20 Feb 2016 (Swedish)(http://www.svt.se/melodifestivalen/svt-bakom-historisk-forandring-infor-eurovisi
on-song-contest-i-stockholm-2016)
10. "Australia To Return To The Eurovision Song Contest"(http://www.eurovision.tv/page/news?id=australia_to_return_t
o_the_eurovision_song_contest). EBU. Retrieved 17 November 2015.
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