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Ireland in the Eurovision Song Contest 2023

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Eurovision Song Contest 2023
Country Ireland
National selection
Selection processEurosong 2023
Selection date(s)3 February 2023
Selected artist(s)Wild Youth
Selected song"We Are One"
Selected songwriter(s)Conor O'Donohoe
Ed Porter
Jörgen Elofsson
Finals performance
Semi-final resultFailed to qualify (12th)
Ireland in the Eurovision Song Contest
◄2022 • 2023 • 2024►

Ireland participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2023 in Liverpool, United Kingdom, with "We Are One" performed by Wild Youth. The Irish broadcaster Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTÉ) organised the national final Eurosong 2023 in order to select the Irish entry for the 2023 contest. Six songs faced the votes of an international jury, a national jury and a public televote which ultimately resulted in the selection of the Irish Eurovision entry.

Ireland was drawn to compete in the first semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest which took place on 9 May 2023. Performing during the show in position 6, "We Are One" was not announced among the top 10 entries of the first semi-final and therefore did not qualify to compete in the final. It was later revealed that Ireland placed 12th out of the 15 participating countries in the semi-final with 10 points.

Background

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Main article: Ireland in the Eurovision Song Contest

Prior to the 2023 contest, Ireland had participated in the Eurovision Song Contest fifty-four times since its first entry in 1965. Ireland has won the contest a record seven times in total. The country's first win came in 1970, with then-18-year-old Dana winning with "All Kinds of Everything". Ireland holds the record for being the only country to win the contest three times in a row (in 1992, 1993 and 1994), as well as having the only three-time winner (Johnny Logan, who won in 1980 as a singer, 1987 as a singer-songwriter, and again in 1992 as a songwriter). Since 2013, only two Irish entries managed to qualify for the final: Ryan Dolan's "Only Love Survives" which placed 26th (last) in the final in 2013, and Ryan O'Shaughnessy's "Together" which placed 16th in the final in 2018. The Irish entry in 2022, "That's Rich" performed by Brooke, once again failed to qualify to the final.

The Irish national broadcaster, Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTÉ), broadcasts the event within Ireland and organises the selection process for the nation's entry. RTÉ confirmed their intentions to participate at the 2023 Eurovision Song Contest on 11 September 2022.[1] From 2016 to 2021, RTÉ held an internal selection to choose the artist and song to represent Ireland at the contest, while RTÉ set up the national final Eurosong in 2022 to choose both the song and performer to compete at Eurovision for Ireland, with both the public and jury involved in the selection. For the 2023 Eurovision Song Contest, RTÉ announced on 30 September 2022 the organisation of Eurosong 2023.[2]

Before Eurovision

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Eurosong 2023

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Eurosong 2023 was the national final format developed by RTÉ in order to select Ireland's entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 2023. The competition was held on 3 February 2023 at the Studio 4 of RTÉ in Dublin, hosted by Ryan Tubridy with Marty Whelan reporting from the green room and broadcast on RTÉ One during a special edition of The Late Late Show. The show was also broadcast online via the RTÉ Player.[3][4] The national final was watched by 472,000 viewers in Ireland with a market share of 44%.[5]

Competing entries

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On 30 September 2022, RTÉ opened a submission period where artists and composers were able to submit their entries for the competition until 28 October 2022.[6] At the closing of the deadline, 330 entries were received.[7] The competing entries were selected through two phases involving a jury panel with members appointed by RTÉ; the first phase involved 60 entries being shortlisted after all of the submissions were reviewed, while the second phase involved the six finalists being selected. The finalists were presented on 9 January 2023 during The Ryan Tubridy Show broadcast on RTÉ Radio 1.[8][9]

Artist Song Songwriter(s)
Adgy "Too Good for Your Love" Andrew Carr, Peter Solymosi
Connolly "Midnight Summer Night" Jennifer Connolly
K Muni and ND "Down in the Rain" Kofi Appiah, Nevlonne Dampare
Leila Jane "Wild" Leila Jane Keeney, Liis Hainla, Arto Ruotsala, Aaron Sibley
Public Image Ltd "Hawaii" John Lydon, Lu Edmonds, Scott Firth, Bruce Smith
Wild Youth "We Are One" Conor O'Donohoe, Ed Porter, Jörgen Elofsson

Final

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The national final took place on 3 February 2023 and featured guest performances from upcoming Irish artists and former contest winner Niamh Kavanagh as well as commentary from a panel that consisted of former contestant Jedward, singer-songwriter Ruth-Anne Cunningham, radio presenter and singer-songwriter Gemma Bradley and opera singer Celine Byrne.[10] Following the combination of votes from an international jury, a national jury and public televoting, "We Are One" performed by Wild Youth was selected as the winner.[7][11] The international jury panel consisted of former contest winner for Denmark Emmelie de Forest, Slovenian composer and producer Žiga Pirnat, Ukrainian Head of Delegation Oksana Skybinska and British contest expert Paul Jordan, while the national jury panel consisted of musician Paul McLoone and presenters Brendan O'Loughlin and Louise Cantillon.[12]

Final – 3 February 2023
Draw Artist Song Jury Televote Total Place
Intl. National
1 Leila Jane "Wild" 2 2 2 6 6
2 Adgy "Too Good for Your Love" 8 4 4 16 5
3 Public Image Ltd "Hawaii" 6 6 6 18 4
4 Connolly "Midnight Summer Night" 12 10 10 32 2
5 Wild Youth "We Are One" 10 12 12 34 1
6 K Muni and ND "Down in the Rain" 4 8 8 20 3

Promotion

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Wild Youth made several appearances across Europe to specifically promote "We Are One" as the Irish Eurovision entry. On 1 April, Wild Youth performed during the Polish Eurovision Party, which was held at the Praga Centrum in Warsaw, Poland and hosted by Poli Genova and Konrad Zemlik.[13][14] Between 2 and 4 April, the band took part in promotional activities in Tel Aviv, Israel and performed during the Israel Calling event held at Hangar 11 of the Tel Aviv Port.[15] The band also performed during the PrePartyES event, which was held on 8 April at the Sala La Riviera venue in Madrid, Spain and hosted by Victor Escudero, SuRie and Ruslana, and during the Eurovision in Concert event which was held on 15 April at the AFAS Live venue in Amsterdam, Netherlands and hosted by Cornald Maas and Hila Noorzai.[16][17] On 16 April, Wild Youth performed the London Eurovision Party, which was held at the Here at Outernet venue in London, United Kingdom and hosted by Nicki French and Paddy O'Connell.[18]

In addition to their international appearances, Wild Youth also completed promotional appearances in Ireland where they performed "We Are One" on the RTÉ One programme The Late Late Show on 29 April.[19]

At Eurovision

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The Sally Gap in County Wicklow was one of the locations of Wild Youth's postcard.
A video postcard introduced Wild Youth's performance in the first semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2023. The postcard was filmed at the Sally Gap in County Wicklow in March 2023 in collaboration with the host broadcaster BBC. The Isle of Wight's Military Road and the Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast region also featured in the Irish postcard.

According to Eurovision rules, all nations with the exceptions of the host country and the "Big Five" (France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom) are required to qualify from one of two semi-finals in order to compete for the final; the top ten countries from each semi-final progress to the final. The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) split up the competing countries into six different pots based on voting patterns from previous contests, with countries with favourable voting histories put into the same pot. On 31 January 2023, an allocation draw was held, which placed each country into one of the two semi-finals, and determined which half of the show they would perform in. Ireland was placed into the first semi-final, held on 9 May 2023, and was performed in the first half of the show.[20]

Once all the competing songs for the 2023 contest had been released, the running order for the semi-finals was decided by the shows' producers rather than through another draw, so that similar songs were not placed next to each other. Ireland was set to perform in position 6, following the entry from Portugal and before the entry from Croatia.[21]

In Ireland, the first semi-final and the final were broadcast on RTÉ One and the second semi-final was broadcast on RTÉ2. Marty Whelan provided commentary for Irish television viewers on all three shows. The first semi-final and the final were also broadcast via radio on RTÉ 2fm with commentary by Zbyszek Zalinski and Neil Doherty.[22] Over 371,000 viewers watched the live broadcast of the final on RTÉ One and its timeshift channel RTÉ One +1, which represented a 38% market share and marked it as RTÉ's most watched programme for that weekend.[23]

Semi-final

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Wild Youth during a rehearsal before the first semi-final

Wild Youth took part in technical rehearsals on 30 April and 3 May, followed by dress rehearsals on 8 and 9 May. This included the jury show on 8 May where the professional back-up juries of each country watched and voted in a result used if any issues with public televoting occurred.[24]

The Irish performance featured Wild Youth performing in a band set-up. The performance began with lead singer Conor O'Donohoe on a horseshoe-shaped LED staircase, where he later descended from to join the other members in front of the staircase. The staging lighting was in gold and black with the LED floor displaying blue and pink dots and pyrotechnic effects being used during the second chorus.[25][26] The creative team that worked on producing Ireland's performance was led by Ian Banham, however, Wild Youth announced before the contest that they had split with Banham after transphobic comments were found to have been posted by him on social media.[27]

At the end of the show, Ireland was not announced among the top 10 entries in the first semi-final and therefore failed to qualify to compete in the final. It was later revealed that Ireland placed twelfth in the semi-final, receiving a total of 10 points.[28]

Voting

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See also: Voting at the Eurovision Song Contest

Voting during the three shows involved each country awarding sets of points from 1-8, 10 and 12: one from their professional jury and the other from televoting in the final vote, while the semi-final vote was based entirely on the vote of the public.[29] Each nation's jury consisted of five music industry professionals who are citizens of the country they represent. This jury judged each entry based on: vocal capacity; the stage performance; the song's composition and originality; and the overall impression by the act. In addition, each member of a national jury may only take part in the panel once every three years, and no jury was permitted to discuss of their vote with other members or be related in any way to any of the competing acts in such a way that they cannot vote impartially and independently. The individual rankings of each jury member in an anonymised form as well as the nation's televoting results were released shortly after the grand final.[30]

Below is a breakdown of points awarded to Ireland and awarded by Ireland in the first semi-final and grand final of the contest, and the breakdown of the jury voting and televoting conducted during the two shows:

Points awarded to Ireland

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Points awarded to Ireland (Semi-final 1)[31]
Score Televote
12 points
10 points
8 points
7 points
6 points
5 points
4 points
3 points
2 points  Portugal
1 point

Points awarded by Ireland

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Detailed voting results

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The following members comprised the Irish jury:

Detailed voting results from Ireland (Semi-final 1)[31]
Draw Country Televote
Rank Points
01  Norway 9 2
02  Malta 13
03  Serbia 14
04  Latvia 7 4
05  Portugal 10 1
06  Ireland
07  Croatia 6 5
08   Switzerland 4 7
09  Israel 5 6
10  Moldova 2 10
11  Sweden 3 8
12  Azerbaijan 12
13  Czech Republic 8 3
14  Netherlands 11
15  Finland 1 12
Detailed voting results from Ireland (Final)[32]
Draw Country Jury Televote
Juror 1 Juror 2 Juror 3 Juror 4 Rank Points Rank Points
01  Austria 23 13 12 20 21 15
02  Portugal 11 14 21 26 22 22
03   Switzerland 24 12 16 18 23 13
04  Poland 22 15 17 23 24 3 8
05  Serbia 25 25 14 6 15 24
06  France 3 7 11 15 6 5 14
07  Cyprus 20 23 13 11 19 17
08  Spain 17 20 25 4 13 23
09  Sweden 2 2 4 3 1 12 5 6
10  Albania 18 19 24 17 25 25
11  Italy 8 18 15 12 14 12
12  Estonia 13 16 3 14 11 20
13  Finland 5 8 6 1 3 8 1 12
14  Czech Republic 7 9 10 5 8 3 18
15  Australia 21 24 1 10 7 4 16
16  Belgium 1 1 2 19 2 10 8 3
17  Armenia 12 11 7 2 5 6 26
18  Moldova 14 10 18 13 17 7 4
19  Ukraine 9 22 19 22 20 4 7
20  Norway 10 17 9 25 16 6 5
21  Germany 19 6 22 7 12 19
22  Lithuania 16 3 8 16 10 1 2 10
23  Israel 6 5 5 8 4 7 10 1
24  Slovenia 15 21 23 9 18 21
25  Croatia 26 26 26 24 26 9 2
26  United Kingdom 4 4 20 21 9 2 11

References

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  1. ^ "Ireland confirm Eurovision 2023 participation". escXtra. 11 September 2022. Retrieved 3 August 2023.
  2. ^ Farren, Neil (30 September 2022). "🇮🇪 Ireland: Eurosong 2023 Submission Window Open". Eurovoix. Retrieved 3 August 2023.
  3. ^ "Ireland reveals 6 potential Eurovision entries". eurovision.tv. 9 January 2023. Retrieved 9 January 2023.
  4. ^ Jiandani, Sanjay (Sergio) (3 February 2023). "Tonight: Eurosong 2023 on Late Late Show in Ireland". Esctoday. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  5. ^ Menéndez, Hugo Carabaña (10 February 2023). "The Late Late Show: Eurosong 2023 arrasa en Irlanda con un 44% de cuota de pantalla y récord de espectadores". ESCplus (in Spanish). Retrieved 20 July 2023.
  6. ^ "Submit your entry to the Eurovision Song Contest 2023". RTÉ. 17 September 2021. Archived from the original on 30 September 2022.
  7. ^ a b Arth, Rick (6 December 2022). "Ireland: National final planned for 3 February...and the studio panel will NOT be allowed to vote". wiwibloggs. Retrieved 9 January 2023.
  8. ^ "Six acts compete to represent Ireland at Eurovision". RTÉ. 9 January 2023. Retrieved 9 January 2023.
  9. ^ "RTÉ has revealed the 6 entries competing in Eurosong 2023". escXtra. 9 January 2023. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  10. ^ "Wild Youth to represent Ireland at Eurovision 2023". rte.ie. RTÉ. 3 February 2023. Retrieved 4 February 2023.
  11. ^ "Ireland: Wild Youth are selected for Liverpool with 'We Are One'". eurovision.tv. 4 February 2023. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  12. ^ "🇮🇪 Wild Youth to represent Ireland at Eurovision 2023". That Eurovision Site. 3 February 2023. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  13. ^ "POLISH EUROVISION PARTY - Praga Centrum, Warszawa - Bilety online". Biletomat.pl (in Polish). Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  14. ^ Vautrey, Jonathan (2 April 2023). "Polish Eurovision Party 2023: Who gave the best live performance?". wiwibloggs. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  15. ^ Hong, Zhi (1 April 2023). "Eurovision 2023: 'Israel Calling 2023' Tel Aviv Pre-party preview". aussievision. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  16. ^ "PrePartyES 2023 in Madrid: Watch the performances". Eurovisionworld. 9 April 2023. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  17. ^ Granger, Anthony (14 April 2023). "Tonight: 🇳🇱 Eurovision in Concert 2023". Eurovoix. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  18. ^ Granger, Anthony (15 April 2023). "Tonight: 🇬🇧 London Eurovision Party 2023". Eurovoix. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  19. ^ Granger, Anthony (30 April 2023). "🇮🇪 Ireland: Wild Youth TV Performance of Revamped "We Are One"". Eurovoix. Retrieved 4 August 2023.
  20. ^ Groot, Evert (31 January 2023). "Eurovision 2023: Allocation Draw results". European Broadcasting Union (EBU). Retrieved 31 January 2022.
  21. ^ "Eurovision Song Contest 2023 Semi-Final running orders revealed!". Eurovision.tv. EBU. 22 March 2023. Retrieved 22 March 2023.
  22. ^ "Everything you need to know about Eurovision 2023". RTÉ. 8 May 2023. Archived from the original on 22 May 2023. Retrieved 7 June 2023.
  23. ^ Mallon, Sandra (15 May 2023). "How Ulster final viewership compared to Eurovision, Late Late Show & Clean Sweep". Irish Mirror. Retrieved 7 June 2023.
  24. ^ Lahav, Doron (28 April 2023). "Eurovision 2023: The Rehearsal Schedule". Esc Beat. Retrieved 1 May 2023.
  25. ^ "LIVE: Eurovision 2023: Semi-Final One first dress rehearsal". ESCXTRA.com. 8 May 2023. Retrieved 3 August 2023.
  26. ^ Granger, Anthony (30 April 2023). "🇮🇪 Ireland: All The Details About Wild Youth's First Rehearsal". Eurovoix. Retrieved 3 August 2023.
  27. ^ Granger, Anthony (26 April 2023). "🇮🇪 Ireland: Wild Youth Drop Eurovision Creative Director Following Transphobic Comments". Eurovoix. Retrieved 3 August 2023.
  28. ^ "Ireland's Wild Youth have crashed out of Eurovision at the semi-final stage". Journal. 9 May 2023. Retrieved 10 May 2023.
  29. ^ "Voting–Eurovision Song Contest". European Broadcasting Union (EBU). Retrieved 14 May 2023.
  30. ^ "Grand Final of Liverpool 2023 - Eurovision Song Contest". eurovision.tv. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  31. ^ a b c "Results of the First Semi-Final of Liverpool 2023". Eurovision.tv. Retrieved 21 November 2023.
  32. ^ a b "Results of the Grand Final of Liverpool 2023". eurovision.tv. Retrieved 14 May 2023.
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