Belarus in the Eurovision Song Contest 2017

Belarus participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2017 with the song "Story of My Life" written by Arciom Lukjanienka. The song was performed by Naviband. The Belarusian entry for the 2017 contest in Kyiv, Ukraine was selected through a national final organised by the Belarusian broadcaster National State Television and Radio Company of the Republic of Belarus (BTRC). The national final consisted of thirteen competing acts participating in a televised production where the winner was determined by a 50/50 combination of votes from jury members made up of music professionals and a public telephone vote. "Historyja majho žyccia" performed by NAVI was selected as the winner.[1] The song's title was later translated from Belarusian to English for the Eurovision Song Contest and was titled "Story of My Life".

Eurovision Song Contest 2017
Country Belarus
National selection
Selection processNational Final
Selection date(s)20 January 2017
Selected entrantNAVI
Selected song"Historyja majho žyccia"
Selected songwriter(s)Arciom Lukjanienka
Finals performance
Semi-final resultQualified (9th, 110 points)
Final result17th, 83 points
Belarus in the Eurovision Song Contest
◄2016 • 2017 • 2018►

Background
Main article: Belarus in the Eurovision Song Contest

Prior to the 2017 Contest, Belarus had participated in the Eurovision Song Contest thirteen times since its first entry in 2004.[2] The nation's best placing in the contest was sixth, which it achieved in 2007 with the song "Work Your Magic" performed by Dmitry Koldun. Following the introduction of semi-finals for the 2004, Belarus had managed to qualify to the final four times. In 2016, Belarus failed to qualify to the final with the song "Help You Fly" performed by Alexander Ivanov.

The Belarusian national broadcaster, National State Television and Radio Company of the Republic of Belarus (BTRC), broadcasts the event within Belarus and organises the selection process for the nation's entry. The broadcaster has used both internal selections and national finals to select the Belarusian entry for Eurovision in the past. Since 2012, BTRC has organised a national final in order to choose Belarus' entry, a selection procedure that continued for their 2016 entry.[3]

Before Eurovision

National final

The Belarusian national final took place on 20 January 2017. Thirteen songs participated in the competition and the winner was selected through a jury and public televote. The show was broadcast on Belarus 1, Belarus 24 and Radius FM as well as online via the broadcaster's official website tvr.by.

Competing entries

Artists and composers were able to submit their applications and entries to the broadcaster between 4 November 2016 and 24 November 2016. At the closing of the deadline, 67 entries were received by the broadcaster. Auditions were held on 30 November 2016 at the BTRC "600 Metrov" studio where a jury panel was tasked with selecting up to fifteen entries to proceed to the televised national final. The auditions were webcast online at the official BTRC website. The jury consisted of Olga Salamakha (deputy director of the TV channel Belarus 1), Inna Mardusevich (chief specialist of the concert and festival art management projects of the Ministry of Culture of Belarus), Elena Treschinskaya (head of the radio station "Radius FM"), Dmitry Dolgolev, Oleg Averin (musician/composer), Ludmila Kutz (singer and vocal teacher), Sergei Andrianov (journalist), Mikhail Revutsky (head of the section of culture at TV Infoservice) and Evgeny Perlin (television host). Thirteen finalists were selected and announced on 30 November 2016.[4]

Final

The televised final took place on 20 January 2017 at the "600 Metrov" studio in Minsk, hosted by Olga Ryzhikova and 2014 Belarusian Eurovision contestant Teo.[1] Prior to the competition, a draw for the running order took place on 9 December 2016.[5] A 50/50 combination of votes from jury members made up of music professionals and a public telephone vote selected the song "Historyja majho žyccia" performed by NAVI as the winner. The jury consisted of Valery Dayneko (chairman of the jury, singer), Olga Salamakha (deputy director of the TV channel Belarus 1), Elena Treshchinskaya (head of the radio station "Radius FM"), Alexander Kapenkin (director of the TV channel TV BelMuz), Vladimir Bogdan (producer, presenter, director of the radio station "Radio New"), Ludmila Kutz (singer and vocal teacher) and Inna Mardusevich (chief specialist of the concert and festival art management projects of the Ministry of Culture of Belarus).[6]

In addition to the performances from the competitors, the show featured guest performances by the hosts Olga Ryzhikova and Teo, 2015 Belarusian Eurovision contestant Uzari and 2016 Belarusian Eurovision contestant Ivan.

Final – 20 January 2017
Draw Artist Song (English translation) Composer(s) Jury Televote Total Place
1 July "Children of the World" Dmitry Fomich 1 7,078 8 9 7
2 Aleksandra Tkach "Be Stronger" Aleksandra Tkach 5 894 2 7 10
3 Vladislav Kurasov "Follow the Play" Vladislav Kurasov, Natalya Rostova 4 463 0 4 11
4 NAVI "Historyja majho žyccia" (Story of my life) Arciom Lukjanienka 12 3,626 6 18 1
5 Isaac Nightingale "On the Red Line" Vadim Kapustin 8 445 0 8 8
6 Kattie "Wild Wind" Anders Hansson, Sharon Vaughn 0 658 1 1 12
7 Nuteki "Take My Heart" Mikhail Nokarashvili, Dawn Michel 10 3,069 5 15 2
8 NAPOLI "Let's Come Together" Michael James Down, Primož Poglajen, Niklas Hast 2 7,271 10 12 5
9 Nikita Hodas "Voices In My Head" Nikita Hodas 7 1,117 3 10 6
10 Angelica Pushnova "We Should Be Together" Kirill Ermakov, Natalya Tambovtseva 3 1,278 4 7 9
11 Anastasiya Sheverenko "We'll Be Together" Maxim Aleynikov, Irina Filatova 6 5,361 7 13 3
12 Lermont x Julic "Heartbeat" Vasiliy Selischev, Anton Rubatskiy 0 202 0 0 13
13 PROvokatsiya "#mylove" Anatoliy Chepikov, Svyatoslav Pozdnyak, Ilya Yermak 0 9,238 12 12 4

At Eurovision

According to Eurovision rules, all nations with the exceptions of the host country and the "Big 5" (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.[7] On 31 January 2017, a special allocation draw was held which placed each country into one of the two semi-finals, as well as which half of the show they would perform in. Belarus placed into the second semi-final, to be held on 11 May 2017, and was scheduled to perform in the second half of the show.[8]

Once all the competing songs for the 2017 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. Originally, Belarus was set to perform in position 15, following the entry from Switzerland and before the entry from Bulgaria.[9] However, following Russia's withdrawal from the contest on 13 April and subsequent removal from the running order of the second semi-final, Belarus' performing position shifted to 14.[10]

Points awarded to Belarus (Semi-final 2)
Televote
12 points 10 points 8 points 7 points 6 points
5 points 4 points 3 points 2 points 1 point
Jury
12 points 10 points 8 points 7 points 6 points
5 points 4 points 3 points 2 points 1 point
Points awarded to Belarus (final)
Televote
12 points 10 points 8 points 7 points 6 points
5 points 4 points 3 points 2 points 1 point
Jury
12 points 10 points 8 points 7 points 6 points
5 points 4 points 3 points 2 points 1 point

Points awarded by Belarus
Split voting results from Belarus (Semi-final 2)
Draw Country Jury Televote
I. Mardusevich L. Kuts V. Aleshko A. Gross L. Shyrin Average Rank Points Rank Points
01 Serbia6868107417
02 Austria544555611
03 Macedonia14171716161612
04 Malta777766516
05 Romania17141515141565
06 Netherlands331443813
07 Hungary1399111312210
08 Denmark1061010129214
09 Ireland11131414151483
10 San Marino16161617171715
11 Croatia81013678374
12 Norway2222221056
13  Switzerland15151213111392
14 Belarus
15 Bulgaria11311112112
16 Lithuania4553347101
17 Estonia912812910138
18 Israel121111981147
Split voting results from Belarus (final)
Draw Country Jury Televote
I. Mardusevich L. Kuts V. Aleshko A. Gross L. Shyrin Average Rank Points Rank Points
01 Israel111311141510116
02 Poland91125899217
03 Belarus
04 Austria1067667420
05 Armenia1714619101315
06 Netherlands474776522
07 Moldova141512101412210
08 Hungary15231318191938
09 Italy13162411121612
10 Denmark7109988321
11 Portugal2152121047
12 Azerbaijan1881612111111
13 Croatia22181820212114
14 Australia348444719
15 Greece23251924222423
16 Spain24192025252524
17 Norway553555665
18 United Kingdom25212122232318
19 Cyprus20121013161413
20 Romania12242216172092
21 Germany21202323242225
22 Ukraine192214171318101
23 Belgium1691515181556
24 Sweden632123883
25 Bulgaria12133112112
26 France8171721201774

References
  1. "Belarus: Eurovision 2017 national final January 20".
  2. "Belarus Country Profile". EBU. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
  3. Granger, Anthony (21 October 2015). "Belarus: 2016 singer to be selected by televote only". Eurovoix.com. Retrieved 1 December 2015.
  4. Stella, Nathan (30 November 2016). "The Belarusian Finalists Are Known!". ESCBubble.
  5. Weaver, Jessica (9 December 2016). "Belarus: Running order decided; national final on 20 January". Esctoday.
  6. "Winner of Eurovision 2017 national selection round to be chosen by jury and TV audience". BTRC. 20 January 2007.
  7. Jordan, Paul (25 January 2017). "Semi-Final Allocation draw to take place in Kyiv". eurovision.tv. Retrieved 25 January 2017.
  8. Jordan, Paul (31 January 2017). "Results of the Semi-Final Allocation Draw". eurovision.tv. European Broadcasting Union. Retrieved 31 January 2017.
  9. Jordan, Paul (31 March 2017). "Semi-Final running order for Eurovision 2017 revealed". eurovision.tv. European Broadcasting Union. Retrieved 12 April 2017.
  10. "EBU: "Russia no longer able to take part in Eurovision 2017"". eurovision.tv. European Broadcasting Union. 22 April 2016. Retrieved 22 April 2016.
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