Eurovision Young Dancers

History

Young Dancers takes place every two-years, in parallel to its successful counterpart, Eurovision Young Musicians (another of the EBU's biennial youth competitions). The inaugural Eurovision Young Dancers contest took place in Reggio Emilia, Italy, on 16 June 1985. Eleven countries who are members of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) competed in the début contest. Spain won the first edition in 1985, represented by Arantxa Argüelles. Norway, represented by Arne Fagerholt, and Sweden, represented by Mia Stagh and Göran Svalberg, came second and third respectively.

A total of thirty-seven countries having competed at least once since 1985. Canada is the only non-European country to have taken part in the contest, although their broadcaster, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), are an associate member of the EBU.

In the entire history of the event, only two contests (2007 and 2009) have never occurred. The 2007 Eurovision Young Dancers was cancelled to allow the Prix de Lausanne, a similar event organised by Swiss broadcaster SRG SSR idée suisse to take place at the same venue. The decision to cancel the contest was mutually agreed between the host broadcaster and the EBU. The following contest was due to be held on 19 June 2009 at the Dance House in Oslo, however was eventually cancelled due to a lack of interest from broadcasters.

On 23 January 2017 the EBU announced that Maltese broadcaster Public Broadcasting Services (PBS), who agreed to host the event in July 2015, had due to circumstances beyond their control been forced to cancel their staging of the competition. The EBU also stated they were looking for another host broadcaster but should one not be found in time the competition would not take place this year and is expected to return in 2019.

Format

The format has been the same since the 1985 inauguration of the competition. All competing dancers are to be non-professional and between the ages of 16–21. Participants may consist of solo or couples, with each performing a dance routine of their choice, which they have prepared in advance of the competition. All of the acts then take part in a choreographed group dance during 'Young Dancers Week'.

Jury members of a professional aspect and representing the elements of ballet, contemporary, and modern dancing styles, score each of the competing individual and group dance routines. Once all the jury votes have been counted, the two participants which received the highest total of points progress to a final round. The final round consists of a 90-second 'dual', were each of the finalists perform a 45-second random dance-off routine. The overall winner upon completion of the final dances is chosen by the professional jury members.

Participation

Eligible participants include primarily Active Members (as opposed to Associate Members) of the EBU. Active members are those who are located in states that fall within the European Broadcasting Area, or are member states of the Council of Europe.

The European Broadcasting Area is defined by the International Telecommunication Union:

The western boundary of Region 1 is defined by a line running from the North Pole along meridian 10° West of Greenwich to its intersection with parallel 72° North; thence by great circle arc to the intersection of meridian 50° West and parallel 40° North; thence by great circle arc to the intersection of meridian 20° West and parallel 10° South; thence along meridian 20° West to the South Pole.

Active members include broadcasting organisations whose transmissions are made available to at least 98% of households in their own country which are equipped to receive such transmissions. If an EBU Active Member wishes to participate, they must fulfil conditions as laid down by the rules of the contest (of which a separate copy is drafted annually).

Eligibility to participate is not determined by geographic inclusion within the continent of Europe, despite the "Euro" in "Eurovision" – nor does it have any relation to the European Union. Kosovo, a partially recognised state in Southeastern Europe, is the only country in Europe who does not yet have EBU members, but has participated once in 2011. Several countries geographically outside the boundaries of Europe have competed: Cyprus and Armenia, in Western Asia (both are members of the Council of Europe with Cyprus as a member state of the European Union). Each made their début at Young Dancers in 1989 and 2013 respectively. In addition, several transcontinental countries with only part of their territory in Europe have competed: Russia, since 1995; Canada in the North America continent, despite only being an associate member of the EBU, have competed twice, in 1987 and 1989.

Thirty-seven countries have participated at least once. These are listed here alongside the year in which they made their début:

Hosting

Most of the expense of the contest is covered by commercial sponsors and contributions from the other participating nations. The contest is considered to be a unique opportunity for promoting the host country as a tourist destination. The table below shows a list of cities and venues that have hosted the Eurovision Young Dancers, one or more times. Future venues are shown in italics. With 3 contests, Poland is the country having hosted the most contests, albeit in different cities.

Winners

Sixteen performances have won the Eurovision Young Dancers competition, a biennial dance contest organised by member countries of the European Broadcasting Union. There have been fourteen contest, with each having a winner, second, and third places for all dance styles combined, with exception to the 1989 Contest which awarded first place for contemporary and classical dance categories; and the 2003 Contest which gave first place prizes for ballet, modern dance, and a 'Youth Jury Choice' categories. From 2011 onwards, there have only been prizes awarded to the winner and runner-up. Below is a break-down of all those winners by each individual event and by number of wins per country.

Winners by country

The table below shows the top-three placings from each contest, along with the years that a country won the contest.