SRF, the Swiss national broadcaster has confirmed to ESCToday that Switzerland will compete at the forthcoming 2019 Eurovision Song Contest in Israel. Switzerland has come up with a brand new concept in order to select its Eurovision entry and act, thus scrapping the televised national final.

The Swiss have revamped their Eurovision national selection and come up with new mechanism in order to determine its Eurovision act and entry for Israel. SRF, RTS, and RSI will be working together in their quest to find the 2019 Eurovision entry and act as has been the tradition.

Revamped national selection

The former televised national final has been scrapped due to austerity measures and financial cuts afflicting the broadcaster. Thus the televoting will be replaced by a special audience panel deliberation and due to budget cuts there will no live televised show.

The 2019 Swiss Eurovision entry will be deliberated by a 100 member audience panel and an international jury of experts.

SRF is inviting musicians, artists and composers to submit their respective entries in order to compete in the national selection as of the start of September. The submission window will be open from 1 September 2018-1 October 2018. SRF has published the rules and regulations for its Eurovision 2019 selection.

Audience panel and expert jury

The 100-member spectator panel will be put together according to selected criteria in cooperation with the longtime SRG partner Digame; everyone can apply for it!

The 100 most suitable applicants will have a say in who should represent Switzerland at the 2019 Eurovision Song Contest. Information on the application process can be found at srf.ch/eurovision.

The 20 jurors of the international expert jury have already proven their experience and expertise as members of their respective juries at the Eurovision Song Contest.

In a multi-stage process, the 100-member audience panel and the 20-member international jury will rate the entries and artists; SRF, RTS, RSI and RTR have the possibility to assign wildcards.

The 2019 Swiss Eurovision entry will be selected via 50/50 international jury-audience panel deliberation. The winning act and entry will be announced at a later date by SRF, RTS, RSI and RTR.

Switzerland in Eurovision

Switzerland is one of the founder members of the Eurovision Song Contest having debuted in the very first contest in 1956 in Lugano. The Alpine nation has won the competition twice with Lys Assia (1956) and Celine Dion (1988).

In 2018, Zibbz won the 2018 Swiss national final and flew to Lisbon with their entry Stones. Despite an energetic performance, the duo failed to qualify to the Grand Final.