National TV Company of Ukraine
42, Melnikova str.,Kyiv, 04119
Public Relations Department
246-85-19, 219-30-97
pr3@ntu.com.ua
Вв
On 28 January 2004 a press conference, devoted to the preparation of NTVCU and
Ruslana Lyzhychko for participation in the “Eurovision- 2004” festival, took place in the
conference hall of NTVCU (National TV Company of Ukraine) (42, Melnykova str.).
The singer, Ruslana Lyzhychko and the administration of the National TV-company of Ukraine
participated in the press conference.
On 12 May 2004 the Ukrainian singer, Ruslana Lyzhychko will perform at one of the most
popular TV festival “Eurovision”. It is the second time in the history, when the Ukrainian singer
participates in this competition.
Like in the previous year, the National TV Company of Ukraine held their own internal
procedure of selecting a participant for the international competition; as a result, Ruslana Lyzhychko
will take part in the “Eurovision - 2004” on behalf of the NTVCU. Now Ruslana is actively preparing
to the Competition. On 31 January during the first promotional visit within the framework of
“Eurovision -2004” Ruslana will take part in the national finale of Byelorussia as a guest.
This year the “Eurovision” festival will be held in Istanbul (Turkey), whose representative,
Sertab Erener became the winner of the last year competition in Latvia, having won the right for her
native country to host the forthcoming festival.
Starting with 2004, the format of “Eurovision” will be changed. From now on the competition
will consist of two parts: the semi-finale and grand-finale. This is aimed at attracting more countriesparticipants of the festival (up to 40 possible participants). This year 36 countries will take part in the
“Eurovision”. 22 countries are to take part in the semi-finale and only 10 of them will be able to get to
the finale, while 24 countries will compete in the grand-finale.
14 out of 24 participants of the grand-finale are already known; they are Turkey – the hostcountry, four countries, which traditionally make biggest investments to the Festival budget, they are:
France, Spain, Great Britain and Germany; nine countries, which had the greatest score in the
competition last year, they are: Austria, Belgium, Ireland, Island, Norway, Poland, Rumania, Russia,
Sweden. 10 more countries will take part in the finale of the competition according to the results of the
semi-finale, they are: Albania, Andorra, Byelorussia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark,
Estonia, Finland, Macedonia, Greece, Israel, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Monaco, the Netherlands,
Portugal, Serbia and Montenegria, Slovenia, Switzerland and Ukraine.
According to the results of Competition-2003 this year Ruslana will compete in the semi-finale
to participate in the finale. This year like in the previous one, the procedure of TV-voting to select the
winner in the semi-finale as well as in the finale will be held. The “Eurovision” finale is to take place
on 15 May.
From the history of the “Eurovision” competition
In the mid-1950s members of the European Language Union set up a committee that was to
unite European countries in the sphere of entertainment. At the end of January in 1955 the committee
decided to launch a music festival similar to the festival in Sun-Remo. The first competition took place
in spring 1956 in Switzerland (Lugano).
Only 7 countries took part in that competition, they were: Belgium, France, Italy, Luxemburg,
the Netherlands, Switzerland and Federal Republic of Germany. The grand-prix of “Eurovision-1956”
was awarded to Switzerland. In 1957 Western Germany was the host country of the festival, since
1958 it has become the annual event and is held in the country- that is the winner of the previous year
competition.
Since 1965 the competition has been broadcast in East European countries. The competition
was so popular, that during the “cold war” period only this TV project was broadcast in the countries
of the former USSR. In the 1980s European audience lost the interest towards the festival - “veteran”,
but in the 1990s we could observe the revival of the interest, especially towards the final part of the
festival. The final concerts, which are traditionally held on Saturday at the end of May, usually show
the highest TV ratings in the whole Europe. Besides, the viewers from the USA, Australia, Middle
East and North Africa also follow the concerts. For today about 40 countries expressed their intention
to participate in the “Eurovision” competition.
The rules of the Competition, the system of evaluation and the number of participants changed
from time to time. In 1996 a decision was made to limit the number of participants to 23 (earlier it was
between 23 - 25), including the country-winner of the previous year competition. At the same time, a
preliminary selection of participants was introduced. It was in 1998 that the TV viewers started to be
involved in voting over the telephone. Since 1999 every participant of the competition has been free
with selecting the song language (earlier the participants had to sing only in their native language).
In 2000 the festival was held at the prestigious Globe Arena in Stockholm. 24 singers performed for 12
000 viewers. Two innovations were introduced during this Competition. Firstly, all performances were
recorded on CDs for commercial sale. Secondly, Microsoft company broadcast the festival online in
the Internet, Demark becoming the winner of Grand-prix.
In 2002 the Competition was hosted by Estonia. New rules of the European Language Union were
introduced, according to which only some countries could participate in the Competition, mainly those,
which had won the first 15 places in Copenhagen and the “great four” (Great Britain, Germany, France
and Spain, which traditionally made biggest investments into the budget of the Festival “Eurovision”).
The countries, whose TV companies were members of the European Language Union, were
eligible to participate in the Competition. The National TV Company of Ukraine is the only member
of the ELU in Ukraine. In 2002 the NTVCU submitted an official application to the ELU for
participation in the Competition. So Ukraine was only a passive participant of the “Eurovision-2002”,
which was held in Tallinn (Estonia). That means, that the NTVCU broadcast the Festival on the
territory of the country, but there was no representative of Ukraine at the Competition.
In compliance with the competition rules, Ukraine got automatically the right to be an active
participant in the Competition of 2003, being a passive participant of the previous year. However, at
the last moment Ukraine was denied participation in “Eurovision - 2003”, because of a great number
of new participants and the ELU being unwilling to refuse some of them. As a compensation they
offered Ukraine to broadcast “Eurovision - 2003” free. Only owing to the active position of the
NTVCU, Ukraine got the exclusive right of active participation in the Competition of 2003. While
Albania, Byelorussia and Yugoslavia remained only passive participants.
The regular 48-th festival “Eurovision” was held on 24 May 2003 in Riga (Latvia). For the first time
Ukraine took an active part in it. Our country was represented by the 7-times winner of the title “The
singer of the Year” - Alexander Ponomarev with the song “Hasta la Vista”. He won the 14th place
among 26 participants.
For more details please call:
246 85-19, Public Relations Department of the NTVCU