Switzerland is gearing up for their upcoming Eurovision participation and since early this year, the national broadcaster of the country, SRF proceeded to announcements regarding their revamped national selection format, which will determine their next Eurovision hopeful.
As already decided by SRF, the Swiss 2019 representative will emerge by the vote of two special appointed jury panels, one of them consisting by 100 Swiss citizens who were chosen after an open invitation of the broadcaster to anybody interested in joining it.
Via a Twitter post, the broadcaster is now announcing that the selection procedure for the best 5 songs which will get one step closer to the coveted Eurovision ticket has been completed. At the moment of writing, music producers are evaluating and recording the songs with several artists. In the end, it will be again in the discretion of the committees to decide who will be the final winner who along with his song will travel to Tel Aviv under the Swiss colours.
The official announcement of Switzerland’s entrant and song will take place in March.
Here is SRF’s post:
Selection update: The audience and expert juries have selected ✅ the Top 5 songs, which are now being tested by music producers with various artists 🎤. Then a next jury evaluation follows. The entry for #Switzerland will be announced in March. #ESC2019 #srfESC @SRF @Eurovision pic.twitter.com/4dao6PaFDT
— SRF ESC (@srfesc) November 16, 2018
Switzerland at Eurovision 2018
After taking place last February, the Swiss national selection show Die Entscheidungsshow 2018 selected the duo ZiBBZ, made of siblings Corinne and Stefan Gfeller, with their pop rock song Stones, to represent the country at the Eurovision Song Contest 2018 in Lisbon.
ZiBBZ participated at the first semi-final of the contest and finally came 13rd with 86 points, thus failing to qualify to the Grand Final. This was the 4th consecutive elimination for Switzerland, which now aspires to reverse its recent poor fortunes and get back to its older glories, with a new national selection system.