Germany will select its entry for the 2015 Eurovision Song Contest tonight! Following the “Clubkonzert” wildcard round two weeks ago, this evening’s Unser Song für Österreich competition in Hanover will use the same complicated format that ended up selecting Elaiza last year – so this is a good opportunity to remind ourselves of how it works!

Just like last year, the eight participants will travel to the German final with two songs in their bags each. The selection procedure is split up into three voting rounds, all of which are based on 100% televoting:

In the first round, every artist will perform one song. The televoters will then pick their four favourites of these. The artists of the other four songs will be eliminated.

In the second round, the four qualifying acts will then present their other song. Now that these four have presented both of their songs in the show, there are a total of eight entries left in the competition. Again, the televoters will pick their favourites. The two songs with the most votes will proceed to the superfinal. If the top two songs are by the same artist, the song in third place will make it to the final round instead. This ensures that two different artists will compete in the superfinal.

In this third and final round, the winner will be decided between the two remaining acts and their most popular songs.

The event is again hosted by Barbara Schöneberger, probably the most popular female host on German television at this time.

Meanwhile, Portugal holds the second semi-final of Festival da Canção ahead of Saturday night’s grand final. The most notable name in tonight’s line-up for ESC fans is undoubtedly Simone de Oliveira, who represented Portugal at the Eurovision Song Contest back in 1965 and 1969.

You can find the details of tonight’s shows on the right-hand side. Further down, you can toggle between “Today” and “Calendar” view.

Don’t forget to join us in the #esc chat, where we’ll be watching, talking about and voting on the shows.
Tonight’s songs will also compete to qualify for our own SongHunt. The scores given to each song by our chatters will have an influence on which songs will qualify for the next heat, to be launched on Sunday.

Click here to read all about SongHunt!

20:15		Germany	Final	Unser Song für Österreich
22:20		Portugal	Semi-final 2	Festival da Canção

(All times CET)

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