Eurovision update: Ulrikke to represent Norway and France goes all out with song selection

The national heats for the Eurovision Song Contest are, er, heating up, with the line-up filling up after this bumper weekend.

Norway has confirmed that they will be sending Ulrikke to Rotterdam, after her song Attention won at the Melodi Grand Prix.

After five regional semi-finals, Ulrikke beat another nine finalists, including gold finalists Raylee (Wild), Kristin Husøy (Pray For Me) and Liz Vassilieva (I Am Gay) to become Norway’s entry.

The powerful ballad is miles away from Norway’s 2019 entry, Spirit In The Sky by KEiiNO, but after the upbeat track came sixth in the grand final, Norway will be hoping it can do just as well.

Ulrikke, 24, has plenty of knowledge about Eurovision – she appeared in the show Addresse: Tel Aviv, and in 2017, she made the gold final of Melodi Grand Prix with her song Places.

Attention was written by 2015 Norwegian Eurovision entrant Mørland, as well as A1 star Christian Ingebrigtsen.

This weekend, Lithuania also held their national finals, called Pabandom iš naujo!, and chose The Roop as their 2020 entrant.

The trio and their song On Fire blew away the competition from seven other finalists, receiving 12 points from both the public and the professional jury.

Lithuania will be hoping The Roop make it to the grand final, as last year’s representative Jurij Veklenko narrowly missed out on a place.

And while we don’t know how they will fare just yet, we are powerless to The Roop’s dancing and the random magnifying glasses.

Armenia’s national selection Depi Evratesil came to a climax over the weekend, with Athena Manoukian being chosen to represent them in May.

Athena and her song Chains On You landed 168 points from the juries and public vote – miles ahead of second place track Life Faces by ERNA.

Armenia didn’t make the final last year, as Srbuk came 16th in the second semi-final.

Elsewhere, both France and Belgium have confirmed their songs.

Tom Leeb will be bringing the French-English ballad The Best In Me to Rotterdam, with the song being written by Leeb himself, Peter Boström, Thomas G:son, John Lundvik, Amir Haddad (France 2016) and Lea Ivanne.

Eurovision fans will know that the writing line-up has some serious ESC chops. John represented Sweden last year, Amir represented France in 2016, and Peter and Thomas are the men responsible for Loreen’s 2012 winning song Euphoria (side note – what a banger).

And Bulgarian entrants Hooverphonic have announced their entry is called Release Me.

The Eurovision Song Contest grand final takes place on 16 May in Rotterdam, with the semi-finals taking place on 12 and 14 of May.

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