Germany: New format adopted for 2016 national final?

News are still unclear and unconfirmed but Italian Eurovision site, Eurofestivalnews has announced the supposed new method the German broadcaster will follow to pick their entry for the contest. Once again, Germany would not get somebody internally chosen for the Eurovision. As the land has not been enjoying good scores for the last 3 years on the Song Contest final scoreboard and after Ann Sophie‘s drama where she got ‘nul points’ with Black Smoke, an entry which was not the one selected by the German audience to represent themselves in Vienna – everyone here remembers Andreas Kümmert declining -, NDR ARD has decided to change things up in order to pick next year’s German Eurovision entrant by adopting a new preselection format similar to the Swedish Melodifestivalen, something which has been in mind for several years.

Unser Song Für Schweden will consist on a single and Clubkonzert show anymore but different stages:

• Singers will be able to apply and send in songs (period extended from the 1st of September 2015 till October 11th)
• From all the contributions received, a still undecided number of participants will enter one of the 6 shows which will be aired through November and December on Einsplus by the German broadcaster.
• 18 artists will qualify to the next stage of the preselection. These will be picked up by a jury made up of the following names: Konstantin Gropper, leader of the band Get Well Soon, Anette Humpe, from the duo Ich + Ich and producers Markus Ganter and Swen Meyer.
• Once the jury has selected the 18 entries, 6 by 6 will presented on each of the 3 shows set on February 12, 19, 26.
• 4 entries will qualify from each of the semis and 12 songs will make up the final line-up of Unser Song Für Schweden on the 4th of March with Barbara Schöneberger as host of the show -again-.
• Jesko Friedrich e Dennis Kaupp will be the hosts of the shows prior to the grand final.

Information about the tickets, venue and location of the shows will be released in due time. Stay tuned to ESC+Plus for further information about the German national final for next year’s Eurovision Song Contest in Sweden, taking place on May 10,12,14 at the Ericsson Globe in Stockholm.

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