It’s the Eurovision down season, and don’t you for a second think we’re going to stop speculating, arguing, and pushing our heated opinions. Our latest series looked at the national finals of Eurovision, and discussing how we would reform the national finals of Eurovision. This time we’re creating national finals from scratch; continuing with The Netherlands.
In part five of this series Daniel, Angus, and Kittens discuss how they’d create a national final for The Netherlands.
Do we think that they will return to a national final, and would we want that?
Daniel
Inside me are two wolves. One wants yet another opportunity to become more engrossed in one of my favourite national music scenes – the other wants the Dutch to only send more experienced performers. especially after the less than stellar time their last few entrants have had at the contest. I think AVROTROS know what they’re doing with the internal selection at the moment, so I don’t foresee them bringing back Songfestival or any other selection format any time soon.
Angus
The rumour mill has been cycling for years now about the potential return of a Dutch NF. As far as I can tell, those talks never really amounted to much of anything. While much might change after Joost Klein’s disqualification, I still expect AVROTROS to get a high enough quantity and quality of entries from acts big and small. And if that is the case, why hold a NF if the internal selections are working so well? That being said, a Dutch NF could be the highlight of the Eurovision year if done well.
Kittens
Whatever you think of their songs, The Netherlands has had quite the messy number of years at Eurovision since winning with ‘Arcade’. But you can’t dispute the music scene and variety coming out of the country. This is not a question of an ill established music scene. Things are definitely happening and risks are being taken (sometimes not in the right way, but at least lessons are being learned). I do think that generally the internal selections are working, and that there is not any immediate need for a switch, but would I be interested selfishly in seeing more Dutch talent competing for the chance to be at Eurovision? Absolutely.
What would our dream national final look like?
Daniel
As much as continuing the legacy of Nationaal Songfestival would be nice, the show was killed off for a reason. It simply was not working to produce not just a Eurovision song, but anything of substance at all – a clean break is needed with a fresh identity, one that can get eyes from both Eurovision fans and your average Dutch music fan.
RPO’s RegioSongfestival has already satiated my need for an annual Dutch music competition, but it attracts generally smaller, indie artists, which goes against my desire for more established performers.
As much as we like to joke here that all Dutch music is either House or Country (which isn’t like, 100% wrong.) – there’s plenty of good music going on in the land of Frikandel and flood defences, I’d like to see a lot of this variety represented, as a lot of the best Dutch music is only really making it as far from Dutch shores as Flanders, which doesn’t even exist.
The likes of Racoon, Merol and Ilse DeLange are all artists who in the last couple of years have either been on Eurovision shortlists or expressed their interest in participating – this is the level that should be aimed for, names near universally known in the country, but only to a few outside their niche in other countries.
Aim for somewhere in the mid single digits in terms of song count, don’t set a fixed amount, if one year you get 8 fantastic entries, great! Only 6 that stand out from the rest another year? 6 it is!
The show in terms of production would be a one and done show with glitz and glamour. If the spaghetti hell that is the Dutch public broadcasting system allows, host it on the same weekend as Het Grote Songfestivalfeest (This on Saturday, Het Grote on Sunday) to have a weekend full of Eurovision mania to kick off national final season with a bang.
This is very anti-me but I’m going to advocate for full televote here – Joost Klein showed this year that if the artist wants it badly and their fans want it too, brilliant things can happen in terms of not only engagement but excitement too.
Oh, and get Nikkie de Jager to host it, please.
Angus
Daniel is on to a lot of good points and ideas with his outline above. The only way to get those big names to compete in such a contest would be if it were connected to something else as well. We don’t have a Sanremo-esque thing in this country, but we could absolutely try and start one. Perhaps somehow combining it with a prestigious festival like Eurosonic Noorderslag (conveniently held in January) could do the trick.
Obviously, Dutch Sanremo would be very different from the Italian one and all the events that get compared to it. But a celebration of the entire Dutch music industry in all its gloriousness and awfulness that culminates in awards being handed out definitely would be fun. For covers night we just make a special edition of Beste Zangers. Selected songs will adhere to Eurovision rules to avoid the awkward editing down we always get from Italy. We make a cursed, broken app where the viewers can rank the songs and vote. Will the results be bad and some of the competing songs even worse? Absolutely! But it will be a fun way to select a song and a good way to showcase our bustling music scene outside our borders.
Kittens
Firstly, I agree with Daniel that everybody should be making the absolute most of Nikkie de Jager, who is an absolute delight. No further notes on that front.
For a country with (at least!) two large Eurovision events that fans travel to from all over the world every year, it seems out of place to not have a national final that makes the most of those events. The energy for travel to the Netherlands is clearly there and clearly has a good reputation. So making the most of Het Grote, even if only as an announcement of artists if it’s too early for the full process, would be a great idea.
I am very much always on the trail of small national finals when countries (re-) start their processes into this sphere, so funnily enough that is where I would start. Even though this is a country with a budget, they need to rebuild both public faith in Eurovision in the context of the 2024 contest, and still produce a good entry. So start small, and move up.
I do think that whoever represents The Netherlands next at Eurovision needs to be carefully chosen – they will be in the public eye very heavily, and the Dutch may be seeking redemption after this year’s contest. Significant thought needs to go into ensuring the act will be ready for the media, the public, and the watchful eye of the naysayers. I would hope that AVROTROS has this firmly in mind this year in particular. After all, with Joost having concerns about returning, any artist taking his shoes will need to be ready for what’s to come.
The Netherlands’s Eurovision Journey
The Netherlands are one of the founding countries of the ESC, having performed the very first song ever on the Eurovision stage back in 1956. While the result of “De Vogels van Holland” is unknown, the Netherlands have garnered 5 wins, with their most recent in 2019. However the Netherlands are also known to have had the longest ever non qualification streak in the semi-final era – they missed out on the final a whopping 8 times between 2005 and 2012.
Joost Klein represented the Netherlands in 2024 with the song “Europapa”. While he was ultimately disqualified, he would have made it to the final, placing second in his semifinal with 182 points.
What do you think about our reforms? As always, let us know what you think by commenting down below. Also, be sure to follow ‘That Eurovision Site’ on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, Threads and Bluesky for all the latest Eurovision news!
News Source: That Eurovision Site
Photo Credit: Corinne Cumming / EBU
Tim J