Ukraine in the Eurovision Song Contest 2010


Ukraine competed in the Eurovision Song Contest 2010. The Ukrainian entry for the contest was originally selected internally by the Ukrainian national broadcaster National Television Company of Ukraine, which Vasyl Lazarovych was the selected in December 2009. On 6 March 2010, a national final was held to select the Eurovision song to be performed. Out of five entries the song "I Love You" was the winner.
However, on 17 March it was announced that a new NTU management would hold another national final on 20 March to select a new Ukrainian entry after objections to the internal selection of Lazarovych as the country's entrant. The winner of the new national selection was Alyosha, who will represent Ukraine with her song "Sweet People", which replaced her song "To Be Free" due to allegations of plagiarism and evidence that the song was publicly available two years prior.

Before Eurovision

First selection

Artist selection

On 29 December 2009, NTU announced Vasyl Lazarovych as the Ukrainian entrant at the Eurovision Song Contest 2010.

National final

The song that Vasyl Lazarovych represented Ukraine with was selected through a national final. Composers had the opportunity to submit their entries between 13 January 2010 and 7 February 2010. Songwriters could hold any nationality, however songs were required to be performed in either English, Ukrainian, Spanish or Italian. A seven-member selection panel reviewed the received submissions and selected five songs to compete in the national final. On 2 March 2010, the titles and songwriters for the five selected competing songs were announced, with the songwriters coming from Ukraine as well as Romania, Germany, Slovenia and Sweden.
The final took place on 5 March 2010 at the NTU studios in Kiev, hosted by Maria Orlova and Timur Miroshnychenko. All five competing songs were performed by Vasyl Lazarovych in both Ukrainian and English versions, and the winning song, "I Love You", was selected through the combination of votes from a public televote and an expert jury. In the event of a tie for the first place, the tie was decided in favour of the entry that received the highest score from the jury. In addition to the performances of the competing entries, 2010 Eurovision entrants Eva Rivas, Sopho Nizharadze, Safura Alizadeh and Miro, as well as Ukrainian singers Irina Rosenfeld, Tatyana Nedelska and Katya Burzynska performed as guests.

Second selection

On 15 March 2010, one week before the deadline for Eurovision entries to be submitted to the EBU, it was announced that NTU may hold another national final to replace Lazarovych as the Ukrainian entry for the Contest, with a new national final to take place on 20 March 2010. However EBU rules may prevent a new national final being held, as Eurovision rules state that national final details must be made known to the EBU by 31 January 2010, and if Ukraine failed to find a replacement song by the submission deadline - 22 March 2010 - due to possible legal action by Lazarovych, then Ukraine may be forced to withdraw. On 17 March 2010, NTU held an emergency press conference to announce plans for a new national final, to be held on 20 March 2010, after objections to NTU's internal selection of Lazarovych and thus an unfair competition for anyone who wished to take part.

Competing entries

Artists and composers had the opportunity to submit their entries by attending an audition on 18 March 2010. A selection panel reviewed 67 received submissions and selected twenty entries to compete in the second national final. The twenty selected competing acts were revealed as 20-second clips, and later as full-length versions on 19 March 2010 during the show Shuster Live, broadcast on the Ukraina channel. Among the competing artists was the previous selected artist Vasyl Lazarovych.

Final

The final took place on 20 March 2010 at the Savik Shuster Studio in Kiev, hosted by Savik Shuster and Olha Freimut. The winner, "To Be Free" performed by Alyosha, was selected through the combination of votes from a public SMS vote and an expert jury. "To Be Free" was composed by Alyosha herself, with lyrics provided Bogdan Chykalyuk who had written the lyrics in 1977 in America. Masha Sobko and Alyosha were tied at 36 points each but since Alyosha received the most votes from the jury she was declared the winner.

Rule violations and replacement entry

After the national final, allegations were made that the song "To Be Free" plagiarized the Linda Perry and Grace Slick song "Knock Me Out", and had been made available publicly 2 years before the national final. NTU stated in a press release that they would conduct an investigation over the issue.
On 22 March 2010, at the start of the Heads of Delegation meeting, it was announced that NTU had been given an extended deadline by the EBU to submit their entry, proposing that they change the song that Alyosha will perform at the Eurovision Song Contest. According to the Head of the Ukrainian Delegation, Viktoria Romanova, "Ukraine has to submit all documents on the new song in Oslo no later than Friday, March 26th 2010." However, it was later stated that because NTU had not submitted their entry to the EBU by the original deadline, the broadcaster would be fined, and would continue to be fined every day after the deadline that no entry has been received. The replacement song, "Sweet People", was presented to the public on 24 March 2010.

At Eurovision

Ukraine will compete in the second semi-final of the contest, on 27 May.

Split results

Semi-final 2

Final

12 points10 points8 points7 points6 points

  • 5 points4 points3 points2 points1 point
  • 12 points10 points8 points7 points6 points

  • 5 points4 points3 points2 points1 point