The January action in this year’s Eurovision national final season came to a close on Saturday night with three semi-finals, in Norway, Iceland and Hungary.

The latter was perhaps the most intriguing, as the interest, fan hype and (relatively!) good result enjoyed by the country last year seems to have paid dividends. Broadcaster MT1 trailed the preselection show all day and, with two semi-finals featuring a decent number of well-known local artists, will be hoping for another qualification in Baku. Meanwhile, the seven songs that will participate in the Icelandic final are now known, and Norway moved closer to completing its line-up.

HUNGARY

As the ten entries in the first Hungarian semi-final were performed, an expert jury – including former Eurovision participants Kati Wolf (2011) and Viktor Rakonczai (1997, 2008 and 2011) – gave its points in “Strictly Come Dancing” style after each song was performed.

The top three with the jury duly moved on to the final:

3rd Caramel – Vízió
2nd Gábor Heincz – Learning to let go
1st Compact Disco – Sound of our hearts

A televote was then held to select one more finalist – which, as it happens, was also the song that placed 4th with the jury:

Gabi Tóth – Nem kell végszó

The second semi-final in Hungary will take place next Saturday.

NORWAY

Further north in Norway, there were no great shocks as the bookmakers’ hot favourite to win the entire Melodi Grand Prix, Plumbo, triumphed in the second semi-final. The positions of the three qualifiers were announced as follows:

3rd Malin – Crush
2nd Tommy Fredvang – Make it better
1st Plumbo – Ola Nordmann

ICELAND

In the last event of the night, the Icelandic final line-up was completed as televoters selected two qualifiers from the third semi to compete on February 11th. They were:

Magni Ásgeirsson – Hugarró
Greta Salóme, Heiða & Guðrún Árný – Aldrei sleppir mér

And it turns out that the final will, in fact, consist of seven songs – with a jury wildcard also being announced tonight. The lucky candidate comes from last week’s second semi-final and is:

Rósa Birgitta Ísfeld – Stund með þér