Country Ukraine Selected entrant Alyosha | Selection date(s) 20 March 2010 Selected song "Sweet People" | |
Selection process Artist: Internal Selection
Song: National Final
Artist: National Final
Song: Internal Selection Semi-final result Qualified (7th, 77 points) | ||
The Ukraine entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 2010 was originally selected internally by the Ukrainian national broadcaster National Television Company of Ukraine (NTU). Vasyl Lazarovych was the original artist, select in December 2009. On 6 March a national final was held to select the Eurovision song to be performed. Out of five entries the song "I Love You" was the winner.
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However, on 17 March it was announced that a new NTU management would hold another national final on 20 March to select a new Ukrainian entry after objections to the internal selection of Lazarovych as the country's entrant. The winner of the new national selection was Alyosha, who will represent Ukraine with her song "Sweet People", which replaced her song "To Be Free" due to allegations of plagiarism and evidence that the song was publicly available two years prior.
Original selection
On 29 December NTU announced that Vasyl Lazarovych had been internally selected to represent Ukraine at the Eurovision Song Contest 2010. The broadcaster officially made a call for songs on 13 January 2010, with no restrictions on songwriters. However songs could only be written in either English, Ukrainian, Spanish or Italian, as well as in both the language it will be performed on stage and in Ukrainian and English versions.
NTU held a national final on 5 March where five songs competed, selected by an NTU jury from the submitted entries. A combination of a professional jury vote and public televote with a 50% stake for both selected the winner, with the jury vote taking preference in the case of a tie. NTU announced the song titles and songwriters for the five entries on 2 March, with songwriters coming from Ukraine as well as Romania, Germany, Slovenia and Sweden.
Guest performances in the final were made by some of this year's Eurovision entries: Armenian singer Eva Rivas, Georgian singer Sopho Nizharadze, Azeri singer Safura Alizadeh and Bulgarian singer Miro, as well as Ukrainian singers Iryna Rozenfeld, Tatyana Nedelska and Katya Burzynska. The song "I Love You", written by German composer Brandon Stone and Ukrainian songwriter Olga Yarynich, was the winner of the final, performed in both English and Ukrainian.
New national final
On 15 March, one week before the deadline for Eurovision entries to be submitted to the EBU, it was announced that NTU may hold another national final to replace Lazarovych as the Ukrainian entry for the Contest, with a new national final to take place on 20 March. However EBU rules may prevent a new national final being held, as Eurovision rules state that national final details must be made known to the EBU by 31 January. As well, if Ukraine fail to find a replacement song by the submission deadline - 22 March - due to possible legal action by Lazarovych, then Ukraine may be forced to withdraw.
On 17 March NTU held an emergency press conference to announce plans for a new national final, to be held on 20 March, after objection's to NTU's internal selection of Lazarovych and thus an unfair competition for anyone who wished to take part. A qualifying rounds was made on 18 March, where 20 finalists were chosen from an open audition of songs. 20 second clips of the songs will be released, with full-length versions of the 20 songs broadcast on Friday on the show "Shuster Live", broadcast on the Ukraina channel. A gala show will then be held on 20 March to select the winner, declared by a televote.
On 18 March, NTU announced 20 selected artists who progressed from the auditions stage out of 67 submissions. The line-up includes the previous selected artist Vasyl Lazarovych. NTU announced the 20 selected songs and their songwriters on 19 March, as well as releasing clips of the 20 competing songs.
After the votes of a professional jury and SMS voting Alyosha and Masha Sobko tied for first place. With Alyosha getting the most points from the professional jury she was declared the winner with her song "To Be Free", with music composed by herself and lyrics provided B. Chukalyuk, who had written the lyrics in 1977 in America.
Rule violations and replacement
After the national final on 20 March, allegations were made that the song "To Be Free" plagiarized the Linda Perry and Grace Slick song "Knock Me Out", and had been made available publicly 2 years before its entry in the national final. NTU stated in a press release that they would conduct an investigation over the issue.
On 22 March, at the start of the Heads of Delegation meeting, it was announced that NTU had been given an extended deadline by the EBU to submit their entry, proposing that they change the song that Alyosha will perform at the Eurovision Song Contest. According to the Head of the Ukrainian Delegation, Viktoria Romanova, "Ukraine has to submit all documents on the new song in Oslo no later than Friday, March 26th 2010." However, it was later stated that because NTU had not submitted their entry to the EBU by the original deadline, the broadcaster would be fined, and would continue to be fined every day after the deadline that no entry has been received. The replacement song, "Sweet People", was revealed on 24 March.
At Eurovision
Ukraine will compete in the second semi-final of the contest, on 27 May.