In his first exclusive report for MaltaMedia, Deo Grech gives a preview to this prestigious song contest that every year grips the imagination of the Maltese people. Will Malta finally have a winning song for Europe, after placing with the top countries over and over again in the last few years?

 

12 January 2000

According to the Eurovision Song Contest's calendar, this weekend is the Big Date for the Maltese Eurovision Fans. Next Saturday a panel of juries will choose the song which will eventually represent Malta at the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) 2000 held in Stockholm, Sweden on Saturday 13th of May.

Malta has been drawn 7th out of 24 entries at the next edition of the Eurovision Song Contest. This will be the first time that Malta will perform at no.7, though it has been drawn at no. 6 ("In a woman's heart", 1996 - placed 10th) and no. 8 ("This Time", 1993 - placed 8th). Malta is going to be the second country to announce it's entry for the ESC2000. Earlier this week Israel announced that the band Ping-Pong has won the right to represent Israel with the song "Same'ach" (trs. "Happy").

Malta will host the Malta Song for Europe Festival 2000 between 13th and 14th January. The 16 finalist songs for the Maltese National final 2000 were announced on Saturday 11th December during a press conference held by the Malta Song Festival Committee at the Corinthia San Gorg Hotel. The Chairman and the Secretary of the Song Festival Committee announced that the 16 songs were chosen from the 224 entries. Finalists were chosen by two sets of expert-juries made-up by a 75% foreign members and 25% local members of the expert-juries. Later on, Paul Zammit Cutajar, composer of "(You will always be) Deep inside my heart" withdrew his entry. This sounded very strange for, as far as we know, this is the first time ever that a composer withdraws an entry from the Maltese national final. Whatever the cause may be, the song is now replaced by the first song on the 'reserved-list'. Paul Giordimaina will perform his own song "The Only One", co-lyricist Fleur Balzan.

Meanwhile an opinion poll which is being carried out on my personal Maltasong Homepage reveals that 66% of the net-users think that this year Malta will be represented by a love ballad. Votes at this opinion poll close on 15th January 2000 - just before the official result from the Malta Song for Europe festival will be announced.

Stay tuned for more reports on the Song Contest.

More information about the Malta Song for Europe Festival from Deo's website at http://maltasong.cjb.net