A total of 242 have been sent in to the Estonian public broadcaster ERR, who will be organizing their annual selection contest Eesti Laul, for the country to choose the act representing the country in Kiev. This marks a record on the number of songs submitted. Last year, the total of tracks received was 238.
An internal panel of music industry professionals will evaluate the entries on the 7th and 8th of November and it will be on this very 8th of November when the broadcaster will be revealing the 20 finalists of this year’s Eesti Laul on its TV program ”Ringvaade”.
Semifinals of Eesti Laul 2017 will be taking place at ERR’s headquarters on the 11th and 18th of February, whilst the grand final is going to be held inside Tallinn’s Saku Suurhall, where the final of ESC 2002 took place. More than a thousand tickets have already been sold out of 5.500, which are expected to follow the same way when the acts are announced on the upcoming 8th of November.
Estonia will try to improve this year’s result who saw Estonian Idol’s winner Jüri Pootsmann ranking last on the 1st semifinal with ”Play”, written by Stig Rästa among others, despite being one of the favorites to make it through.