🇵🇹 Mimicat wins Festival Da Canção 2023 with “Ai Coração”

We almost have our complete 2023 Eurovision line up! Portugal has become the last country to select their entry through their national final, Festival Da Canção. Following this year’s competition, Mimicat will represent Portugal on the Liverpool stage with “Ai Coração”.

Festival Da Canção 2023: The Full Results

The results for this year’s final are as follows:

Running Order	Artist	Entry	Jury Result	Televote Result	Overall Result
1	Cláudia Pascoal	“Nasci Maria”	8	4	12
2	Churky	”Encruzilhada”	0	5	5
3	Esse Povo	“Sapatos de Cimento”	4	0	4
4	Bárbara Tinoco	“Goodnight”	3	6	9
5	You Can’t Win, Charlie Brown	“Contraste Mudo”	7	0	7
6	Voodoo Marmalade	”Tormento”	0	7	7
7	INÊS APENAS	”Fim do Mundo”	2	1	3
8	Mimicat	”Ai Coração”	12	12	24
9	Dapunksportif	“World Needs Therapy”	0	8	8
10	Neon Soho	”Endless World”	5	0	5
11	Ivandro	”Povo”	6	3	9
12	Edmundo Inácio	”A Festa”	12	10	22
13	SAL	“Viver”	1	2	3

Festival Da Canção 2023

The long standing Portuguese song contest returns for its 57th edition. The format has been used extensively by national broadcaster RTP to select Portugal’s Eurovision entry; having only been uninvolved in two of Portugal’s Eurovision participations.

The 13 qualifiers were decided by a hybrid, two round voting system. The first round selected five finalists using an equally weighted jury and televote. Both the jury and televote were allocated Eurovision style (first place being awarded 12 points, the second 10 points, and so on and so forth), before being combined. After the first qualifiers were announced a second round of voting began which saw a pure televote decide the remaining finalist.

Due to an error with the voting system in the first semi-final an extra finalist was announced in the first round as due to the televote partly failing. The name of the automatic qualifier was not made publicly available at time of writing and was announced at random with the other qualifiers.

Portugal’s Eurovision Journey

Portugal debuted in the Eurovision Song Contest with António Calvário’s “Oração” in 1964. Since then, Portugal has participated in the competition 53 times – appearing the final 44 times. Their only win in the competition came in 2017 with Salvador Sobral, performing his heart-wrenching song “Amar Pelos Dois”. Portugal’s most recent participation was with MARO with the song “saudade, saudade”. MARO managed to qualify for the Grand Final and once there, she finished 9th, after receiving 207 points from the jury and the televote.

What did you think of Festival Da Canção 2023? Are you happy with their selection? Let us know in the comments below or on social media. Don’t forget to follow “That Eurovision Site” on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter as we prepare for Eurovision 2023!

News Source: RTP

Photo Credit: RTP/Pedro Pina