Much in the way of speculation has happened when Ukraine’s Jamala won in Sweden. The first question is where the Eurovision Song Contest will take place, and it is probably the most important question for the contest each year. Everything else comes from that initial decision, so where WILL Eurovision be held in 2017? Ukraine is about to hold a host “City Battle” to find out!
Undoubtedly, the Eurovision Song Contest is a huge event for a city to host, with the increasing technology of the show and infrastructure being of a caliber that is slowly shrinking the pools of cities that can pull it off, let alone put on a show that will be remembered for years to come. Not every country has a Melodifestivalen to look to, or the budget to create a new state-of-the-art venue, like Azerbaijan did with the Crystal Hall.
Six cities have applied to host the contest for the Ukraine. Kiev, Odessa, Dnipropetrovsk, Lviv, Kharkiv and Kherson, and many Eurovision news outlets have been vocal about the lack of the venues in these cities to hold the amount of patrons the EBU would like, which is 10,000, and at the very least 7,0000. Ukrainian Minister for Culture, Yevhen Nyshcuuk even went on record saying, “We don’t have any suitable indoor arenas which can serve many people.”
That doesn’t even touch the issue of technology, which in recent years has been becoming a larger part of the Eurovision show, which incidentally, were purportedly a problem the last time Ukraine hosted in 2005.
In the process of the selection will now take a more public turn as the Ukraine will air a program called “City Battle” today at 17:30 CET across a number of platforms, UA:Pershyi, Ukrainian Radio, official NTU YouTube channel and their Facebook page. The representatives of the six cities will present their proposals as to how the venue will meet the EBU requirements. Musical experts as well as the Organizational Committee, Eurovision fan club in Ukraine, and media representatives will be present in studio and will take part in the discussion which will bring the options for host city down to two finalists. A national final for cities, if you will. Interesting to say the least, but in a few short days we’ll see if it goes well enough to become a thing that continues in each year’s bidding process.
Check some pictures of yesterday’s rehearsal below:
https://www.facebook.com/1tvua/posts/1459323740760326
Could Ukraine build a new facility, or get creative like Copenhagen did in 2014 by re-purposing a shipyard building to spectacular effect? Will security issues be a topic mentioned by the delegations? After credible threats to Stockholm and skirmishes across the country, Ukrainian cities will now have to convince fans that it will be a safe event as well as an enjoyable one.
Stay tuned for the answers as the 2017 Eurovision train leaves the station in earnest!
Follow the Eurovision “City Battle” live, hosted by Timur Miroshnychenko, at 17.30 CET on YouTube, Facebook and NTU1.