Romania in the Eurovision Song Contest 2018

1. Focșani

2. Timișoara

3. Craiova

4. Turda

5. Sighișoara

Bucharest

Cities where the shows took place. The location of the final is shown in bold.

Selecția Națională 2018 was the national final organised by TVR in order to select Romania's entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 2018. The competition consisted of six shows: five semi-finals featuring twelve songs each and a final featuring fifteen songs to be held between 21 January and 25 February 2018.[5] Under the slogan Eurovision unește România! (Eurovision unites Romania!), the competition took place in different cities across Romania, in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Union of Transylvania with Romania (also known locally as the "Great Union") which gave the country its largest peacetime geographical extent.[6][7] All shows were hosted by Diana Dumitrescu and Cezar Ouatu.[8] All shows were televised on TVR1, TVR HD, TVRi and in Moldova via the channel TVR Moldova as well as online via the broadcaster's streaming service TVR+ and YouTube. The day before each show, TVR aired a behind-the-scenes program containing interviews, as well as pre-recorded inserts such as rehearsal, press conference footage and other backstage material.[9]

TVR opened a submission period for artists and composers to submit their entries between 15 November 2017 and 15 December 2017.[10] The broadcaster received 72 submissions after the submission deadline passed.[11] 69 entrants participated in auditions at the TVR Studio 2 in Bucharest in front of a five-member expert committee between 19 and 20 December 2017.[12] The auditions were later broadcast on TVR1 and TVR HD between 12 and 15 January 2018.[13][14][15][16] From the auditions, sixty entries were selected for the national final. No performer was allowed to have more than one song in the semi-finals, but there was no such limit for songwriters. It was also disallowed to circumvent this rule by replacing the performer. The competing entries were announced on 22 December 2017.[17] Among the competing artists were MIHAI, who previously represented Romania in the Eurovision Song Contest in 2006, as well as Alex Florea, who previously represented Romania in the Eurovision Song Contest in 2017.[18]

The members of the expert committee that selected the sixty entries were:[19]

• Marian Ionescu — bass guitarist, pianist, composer, founder of the band Direcția 5
• Liliana Ștefan — lyricist, composer of the Romanian 1998 Eurovision entry
• Nicu Patoi — guitarist, accompanied Mălina Olinescu at the Eurovision Song Contest 1998
• Ilinca Băcilă — singer, represented Romania in the Eurovision Song Contest 2017
• Viorel Gavrilă — composer, conductor, multiple-time winner at the Mamaia Festival

On 9 January 2018, "Fix Me", written by Victoria Iona Badea and Alexandru Daniel Gâjâilă and to have been performed by Freia, was originally selected but was disqualified from the competition (due the song having been released in China prior to the 1 September 2017 cutoff date) and replaced with the song "Baby You're the Only One" performed by Tomer Cohen.[20]

The first semi-final took place on 21 January 2018 at Teatrul Municipal "Maior Gheorghe Pastia" in Focșani.[22] TVR Iași presenter Anca Medeleanu hosted segments from the green room.[9] Tom Hartis, who was drawn to perform sixth in the semi-final, withdrew from the competition due to health problems. Eleven songs competed and a jury panel selected three songs to qualify to the final: "Walking on Water" performed by Alexia & Matei, "Mirror" performed by Echoes and "Me som romales" performed by Eduard Santha.[23][24] In addition to the performances of the competing entries, the opening act featured 2005 Romanian Eurovision entrant Luminița Anghel performing the song "Hora din Moldova" with the Țara Vrancei Folk Ensemble and the interval act featured performances by the band Pasărea Rock.[9]

The second semi-final took place on 28 January 2018 at Teatrul Național "Mihai Eminescu" in Timișoara.[22] TVR Timișoara presenter Doriana Talpeș hosted segments from the green room.[26] Twelve songs competed and a jury panel selected three songs to qualify to the final: "Auzi cum bate" performed by Jukebox feat. Bella Santiago, "We Are One" performed by Rafael & Friends and "Heaven" performed by MIHAI.[27][28] In addition to the performances of the competing entries, the opening act featured Ricardo Caria performing the song "Amar pelos dois" and the interval act featured performances by Cargo, Lavinia Răducanu and Neda Ukraden.[26] The city contributed 200,000 lei (€43,000) towards organizing the event.[29]

The third semi-final took place on 28 January 2018 at Teatrul Național "Marin Sorescu" in Craiova.[22] TVR Craiova presenter Alina Șerban hosted segments from the green room.[31] Twelve songs competed and a jury panel selected three songs to qualify to the final: "All the Love Away" performed by Erminio Sinni & Tiziana Camelin, "Try" performed by Xandra and "La la la" performed by Vyros. In addition to the performances of the competing entries, the interval act featured performances by BiBi, FreeStay, Dan Helciug and Mihaela Alexa.[31] The city contributed 190,379 lei (€40,795) towards organizing the event.[32]

The fourth semi-final took place on 11 February 2018 at the Rudolf Mine in Salina Turda.[22] TVR Cluj presenter Loredana Corchiș hosted segments from the green room.[33] Twelve songs competed and a jury panel selected three songs to qualify to the final: "The One" performed by Claudia Andas, "Deșert de sentimente" performed by TIRI and "Bună de iubit" performed by Feli.[34] In addition to the performances of the competing entries, the interval act featured performances by 2009 Romanian Eurovision entrant Elena Gheorghe, Ad Libitum and Katia Cărbune.[33] The city contributed approximately 140,000 lei (€30,000) towards organizing the event.[35]

The fifth semi-final took place on 18 February 2018 at Sala de Spectacole "Mihai Eminescu" in Sighișoara.[22][36] TVR Tîrgu-Mureș presenter Simona Boantă hosted segments from the green room.[37] Twelve songs competed and a jury panel selected three songs to qualify to the final: "Goodbye" performed by The Humans, "Fly" performed by Teodora Dinu and "Fără tine" performed by Dora Gaitanovici. In addition to the performances of the competing entries, the interval act featured a pre-recorded open-air concert by Direcția 5, filmed in the Piața Cetății in Sighișoara the previous evening.[37]

The final took place on 25 February 2018 at Sala Polivalentă in Bucharest.[22] Ioana Voicu and Sonia Argint-Ionescu hosted segments from the green room.[38] Fifteen songs competed and the winner, "Goodbye" performed by The Humans, was selected exclusively by public televoting.[2][39] In addition to the performances of the competing entries, the interval acts featured performances by 2018 Moldovan Eurovision entrants DoReDoS performing their Eurovision song "My Lucky Day", as well as performances by 2017 Romanian Eurovision entrant Ilinca Băcilă and Alex Calancea Band.[38]

The Humans performing on the Eurovision stage.

The Humans took part in technical rehearsals on 1 and 4 May,[42][43][44] followed by dress rehearsals on 9 and 10 May.[45][46] This included the jury show on 9 May, where the professional juries of each country watched and voted on the competing entries.[47]

The Romanian performance featured five of the members of The Humans performing together on stage with a female cellist dressed in a white gown; the male members were dressed in white outfits, of which the two guitarists wore white masks on the backs of their heads, while the female lead singer was dressed in a purple frock.[42] The stage presentation featured 25 black and white mannequins wearing white masks on their faces.[42][48] For the performance, The Humans lead singer Adrian Tănase was replaced by cellist Corina Matei.[49]

At the end of the show, Romania was not announced among the top 10 entries in the second semi-final and therefore failed to qualify to compete in the final. This marked the first time that Romania failed to qualify for the final of the Eurovision Song Contest since the introduction of semi-finals in 2004.[50] It was later revealed that Romania placed 11th with a total of 107 points: 40 points from the televoting and 67 points from the juries, but missed qualifying for the final by a mere 4 points difference from Hungary.[51]

Voting during the three shows involved each country awarding two sets of points from 1 to 8, 10 and 12: one from their professional jury and the other from televoting. Each nation's jury consisted of five music industry professionals who are citizens of the country they represent, with their names published before the contest to ensure transparency. 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, no member of a national jury was permitted to 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 as well as the nation's televoting results were released shortly after the grand final.

The following five members comprised the Romanian jury: [52]

• Mihai Mircea Alexandru (Al Mike) – Chairperson – composer, music producer
• Nicu Patoi – musician
• Anca Lupeș – music business consultant
• Sanda Cepraga – sound director
• Gabi Cotabiță – musician

Split voting results from Romania (Semi-final 2)
Draw	Country	Jury							Televote
		N. Patoi	A. Lupeș	S. Cepraga	G. Cotabiță	Al Mike	Average Rank	Points	Rank	Points
01	Norway	10	4	10	13	10	9	2	5	6
02	Romania
03	Serbia	4	9	5	3	5	5	6	7	4
04	San Marino	5	8	4	7	4	6	5	17
05	Denmark	17	15	14	14	16	16		3	8
06	Russia	16	17	12	17	15	15		10	1
07	Moldova	1	1	1	1	1	1	12	1	12
08	Netherlands	8	2	2	2	6	3	8	8	3
09	Australia	11	11	15	10	9	12		4	7
10	Georgia	15	16	16	16	17	17		16
11	Poland	9	12	11	11	11	11		12
12	Malta	2	3	3	8	2	2	10	14
13	Hungary	6	6	8	5	8	8	3	2	10
14	Latvia	12	7	9	9	12	10	1	13
15	Sweden	14	14	13	12	13	13		9	2
16	Montenegro	3	13	6	4	3	4	7	15
17	Slovenia	7	5	7	6	7	7	4	11
18	Ukraine	13	10	17	15	14	14		6	5

Split voting results from Romania (final)
Draw	Country	Jury							Televote
		N. Patoi	A. Lupeș	S. Cepraga	G. Cotabiță	Al Mike	Average Rank	Points	Rank	Points
01	Ukraine	17	18	21	21	17	20		21
02	Spain	1	3	2	8	2	2	10	23
03	Slovenia	13	14	14	2	11	10	1	25
04	Lithuania	5	5	3	6	12	5	6	18
05	Austria	4	1	1	3	4	1	12	20
06	Estonia	8	2	7	5	14	8	3	12
07	Norway	14	13	11	13	13	14		17
08	Portugal	21	17	16	20	20	19		26
09	United Kingdom	18	22	19	19	19	21		22
10	Serbia	22	21	17	18	25	23		15
11	Germany	7	4	4	17	5	7	4	7	4
12	Albania	11	7	24	10	15	13		13
13	France	25	23	26	22	21	25		11
14	Czech Republic	23	24	23	14	22	22		8	3
15	Denmark	26	26	25	26	23	26		9	2
16	Australia	12	11	8	4	7	9	2	14
17	Finland	20	16	18	11	24	18		24
18	Bulgaria	16	19	15	23	10	16		6	5
19	Moldova	6	15	5	9	1	4	7	1	12
20	Sweden	19	12	22	15	16	17		19
21	Hungary	24	20	20	16	26	24		2	10
22	Israel	9	10	13	25	8	11		3	8
23	Netherlands	2	6	6	1	6	3	8	16
24	Ireland	15	25	9	24	9	15		10	1
25	Cyprus	3	8	12	7	3	6	5	4	7
26	Italy	10	9	10	12	18	12		5	6