Your vote counts too
For the first time ever, the quirky yet strangely compelling Eurovision Song Contest has invited a country from Oceania to compete as a guest. You probably know by now that that country is Australia where, over the years, SBS radio and television have led a Eurovision cult following. Our own Guy Sebastian has been chosen to sing a tune called Tonight Again which he wrote in just one week together with songwriters David Ryan Harris and Louis Schoorl.
Along with the spot in the competition, Australia was also asked to provide five Jury Members plus a backup. Half come from the Radio industry.
The backup is Chris Holland, Announcer and Music Director at 99.5 Sea FM Cairns.
The others on the list are…
Smoothfm’s Richard Wilkins
Shazam Top 20’s Ash London
Bluejuice singer Jake Stone
Singer/ songwriter Danielle Spencer
Chairperson of the Australian contingent is Music and Concert producer, Amanda Pelman.
Read more on the jurors here.
The 240 strong Jury makes up 50% of the vote with audiences from each participating country making up the other half – this time, including Australia. No one, however, can vote for their own country.
According to the Eurovision site…
• 106 jury members are female, 131 are male, 3 are still missing
• The average age is 40 years (age on the day of the Final)
• The two youngest jury members are 17 (in Israel and Sweden)
• The oldest jury member is 86 (in Slovenia)
• There are 2 teenagers, 35 jury members in their twenties, 81 in their thirties, 70 in their forties, 32 in their fifties, 15 in their sixties, 1 in his seventies and 1 in his eighties
Australia’s ‘wild card’ invitation is largely due to the efforts of SBS which has long been an enthusiastic broadcaster of this distinctively European event on both its television and radio services and follows the success of Jessica Mauboy’s performance last year in Denmark.
This year, for the first time, Australians will have a vote too.
The Australian telephone and SMS numbers will be announced 24 hours before the first Semi Final.
The event will be held in Vienna, Austria with Semi-Final 1 on Friday 22 May. Semi-Final 2 on Saturday 23 and the Grand Final Sunday 24 May.