Although we struck a hopeful tone the other day, our hopes quickly proved unfounded. On Wednesday, the EBU announced that the 2020 Eurovision Song Contest has been cancelled altogether.

Whether you agree with the rationale or not, the FAQ section on the announcement page is comprehensive and balanced. Ultimately, it feels like the decision came down to two factors: Firstly, although some kind of remote/video-based show would have been technically feasible, the EBU doesn’t consider this to be consistent with the spirit of what ESC is and has become, so it’s better to cancel the event altogether than settle for something inferior.

And secondly, no one knows how the coronavirus crisis is going to evolve from here. Postpone ESC until the autumn and it might still take place among extensive travel restrictions; hold a stripped-down version in May and it could be sandwiched by news reports of mass deaths around the continent. Even in the spirit of “coming together”, a cheerful light entertainment show would feel completely wrong in that context – no artist or broadcaster would especially want to be associated with it, nor would us fans want to be seen as part of something that completely misjudged the mood of the continent.

And so there will be no ESC 2020. It hurts. Of course it does. A year without the Eurovision Song Contest is practically inconceivable. The only small consolation is that the crisis is affecting every interest, every sport, everyone’s personal travel plans – right down to how we live our daily lives. Even historic events like the Monaco Grand Prix have proven powerless to resist – and so, too, has the mighty ESC. So be it. There are, right now, more important things to worry about.

There are still many open questions concerning ESC 2021. Will it be held in Rotterdam? Will the 2020 songs be given an exception so that they can compete in 2021 – and if so, how many broadcasters will take up that right? We know that many of the 2020 artists have already been told by the respective national broadcasters that they can have the ticket to ESC 2021 automatically. That’s a nice touch. And there’s plenty of time to answer the rest of the questions once the worst of the crisis has subsided.

For us here at escgo!, one thing is clear: we think the songs of ESC 2020 deserve the same attention they would have got if the show had gone ahead as planned. So we will still be holding our ChatVote in mid-April to find our chatters’ favourite entry from the ESC 2020 bunch, albeit on a smaller scale than usual. And we will be continuing with our SongHunt to find the best non-winning national final song of the season (though possibly with a shortened schedule, since it no longer needs to culminate around the time of ESC itself). All the more so given the prospect of lots of internal selections in 2021 – there might not be much SongHunt content to work with next year!

Meanwhile, our team will be taking their various family commitments and home-working restrictions as an opportunity to do some blogging about past ESC glories – and to remind ourselves that there are many glories still to come, once the crisis has abated and Europe returns to some kind of normality again.

We hope you and your loved ones are keeping well in these strange times. Look after yourselves, look after those around you – and keep chatting. It’s good to talk!

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So this is turning out to be a strange year, isn’t it?

I was going to write a blog post on behalf of the escgo! team anyway at some point.

I was going to explain that (unlike most recent years) we aren’t going to be in the press centre this year, but that we’ll be delivering our usual analysis from afar – including our line-up check in April, my betting insights and Shi’s “View from San Francisco” longreads.

I was going to apologise for the lack of content on this site other than our weekly SongHunt, which you have been taking to your heart and voting in (thanks for that!). Family health and other issues have taken their toll on our small blogging team this winter, so we decided to focus on the heart of our community – the chat and related events – and worry about the content side of things later.

And then the Coronavirus, COVID-19, began its steady march across the world and everything was suddenly up in the air anyway, including our beloved Eurovision Song Contest.

Obviously there are more important things than ESC right now. Keeping ourselves and our families safe, first and foremost. But as the Italians singing from their balconies have shown us, people need a bit of solidarity and light relief in times like these – not least when they’re being asked to self-isolate and stay inside their homes.

It looks highly doubtful as to whether ESC 2020 can take place in Rotterdam in the originally planned form. Even in the context of a global crisis, that’s a huge shame for the fans who have paid large amounts of money to be there, and for the artists and delegations who won’t be getting the unique experience they thought they were getting when they won their tickets to the big contest. There’s still talk of “ESC behind closed doors” – the full arena show, just without any fans present – but that seems increasingly unlikely as borders are closed and travel restrictions imposed.

The EBU and the Dutch organisers have understandably been keeping their cards close to their chest, as there’s no need for hasty decisions in a situation that is evolving every day. However, the broad understanding is that “some kind of ESC in May” is seen as preferable to the logistical headache of delaying the contest until later in the year. As such, right now we’re probably looking at a studio-based contest in which the artists each perform in their own countries, with the Dutch hosting the international link-up and providing some kind of show as a framework around the whole thing.

Whatever ESC 2020 ends up being, it’s clear that it’s going to be a unique one in the contest’s history. But we’re assuming and being optimistic that it will still happen one way or another – so we’ll shortly be getting stuck into our traditional line-up check, even if predictions are made harder by not knowing the format of the show. And, of course, we’ll be holding our traditional ChatVote in April no matter what.

The Eurovision Song Contest was originally created to bring the people of Europe together in turbulent times – let’s hope the 2020 edition gets the chance to prove how good it is at still doing exactly that.

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It’s that time of year again! Never mind the Albanian final or the slow trickle of news about internal selections – the allocation draw for the forthcoming ESC is when we really know the on-season is underway, even if (as always) there’s only so much we can really learn from the outcome at this early stage.

This afternoon saw the allocation draw for the 2020 Eurovision Song Contest taking place at the City Hall in Rotterdam. As in recent years, the countries had previously been divided into “pots” based on their voting history with the aim of ensuring a balanced spread across the two semi-finals. To allow the delegations to make their travel plans based on the preliminary rehearsal schedule, the participating countries were also assigned to either the first or second half of the respective show.

We also discovered that, with an uneven number of countries (41) taking part this year, the first semi-final will have 17 entries and the second will be notionally more competitive with 18.

The draw was as follows:

The “big five” countries and the Netherlands, who are already qualified for the grand final, were also assigned to the semi-finals that they are required to broadcast and vote in:

Germany, Italy and the Netherlands will vote in the first semi-final on Tuesday 12 May.
France, Spain and the United Kingdom will vote in the second semi-final on Thursday 14 May.

As has been the case since ESC 2013, the exact order of performance will be decided by the producers once all the entries have been chosen, the aim being to create a varied and interesting running order.

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