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 Armenia.
In part nine of this series Euan, Angus, and Daniel discuss how they’d create a national final for Armenia.
Do we think that they will return to a national final, and would we want that?
Euan
I don’t think a national final is on the cards at the minute. I don’t think that there’s really the funding for such extra Eurovision content at the minute. Personally I think this is one of the only countries that shouldn’t go for a national final at all. I’ve loved Armenia in Eurovision these part two years more than anything they’ve done prior, and I don’t think a national final in the current musical climate would produce high quality entries for Eurovision.
Daniel
Their current system is working perfectly well for them, so there’s no reason to change things up for the sake of it. Their NF format didn’t yield nearly as good results as they’re getting internally, keep things as they are, because I’m swiftly becoming something of an Armenia stan!
Angus
Armenia is doing fine without a NF. Unless there is a collapse in the quality and quantity of songs that the broadcaster can pick from I don’t see any reason why they would or should want to change course. Would I like another music contest just so I get introduced to even more artists and songs? Sure! But beyond that general desire for more music, I really don’t feel like I need an Armenian NF.
What would our dream national final look like?
Euan
Armenia is at it’s best when it focuses on highly established acts rather than fresh talent, and I think that should be a continued focus if they ever did return to a national final. I believe that the best outcome would be to internally select an known entity in Armenia very early in the year, and provide them with the means of producing a handful of, say three, songs for a concise national final. Host a big song writing camp with established names in the Armenian music scene and find something distinctly, and authentically Armenian. Then give put it in a two round selection with an equally weighted jury and televote in the first, and pure televote in the gold final.
Daniel
There are more Armenians in a globally widespread diaspora than there are in Mother Armenia, and I’d love to see that represented in some way. In what I am in my head dubbing Una Voce Per Tamar Kaprelian I’d have a group of around 5-6 artists with a similar geographic distribution to Genealogy, compete to battle amongst 5 born and bred Armenian acts in a style similar to ESCZ 2023. Host it in a TV Studio without a live audience. 50/50 with juries (including diaspora representation) and proportional televote would make for a fine little show.
Angus
If I see Euan propose a decent format only to ruin it with a gold final one more time in my life… Anyway, preselecting an artist that presents an EP worth of songs would definitely be the way to go. Depending on the artist you can take the camp route, but if you have an act who writes most or all of their own work they should be let free to do their thing. All that being said, Armenia is in a fairly unique situation with their diaspora as Daniel notes, and it feels like a waste not to highlight it. So how about a compromise. Go the songwriting camp route, but have songwriters from across the globe write. It’s at least worth a punt to see what kind of excellent melodies would roll out of that.
Armenia’s Eurovision Journey
In 2006, Armenia made their debut into the Eurovision Song Contest, where André represented the nation with his entry “Without Your Love”, placing 8th overall. Since their debut, Armenia has participated 16 times, 13 of which saw them make the Grand Final. Their best result, in 2008 and 2014, was 4th place; in 2008, Sirusho and “Qélé Qélé”, and in 2014, Aram MP3 with “Not Alone”.
French-Armenian band Ladaniva represented Armenia at the most recent contest, where they ultimately scored eighth in the grand final. Between the televote and the juries, “Jako” received 138 total 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: Sarah Louise Bennett / EBU
Tim J