The four-week-long Polish Eurovision marathon has finally come to an end with Alicja Szemplińska winning the ticket to Rotterdam at Szansa na Sukces. Eurowizja 2020. She will sing the song Empires on May.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om91-RjTr8k
Poland’s national final: summary
This year’s national final has been special for a number of reasons. For the first time in history the old talent show format Szansa na sukces was used for the selection process. It was also the first ever time for Polish preselections to feature televised semi-finals. Each semi-final episode had yielded one contestant who presented today a cover song and their own entry for Eurovision Song Contest 2020. The jury in all semis were former Polish representatives at ESC – Cleo (2014), Gromee (2018) and Michał Szpak (2016), but this time they support our finalists. In the jury of the final episode were TVP employees: Anna Cyzowska-Andura, Konrad Smuga and Grzegorz Urban. The final episode, however, was the one where televoters had a say in choosing the winner as well. Both jury and televoters awarded their sets of points which then were aggregated into a final result. The songs sung by each participant and their scores are as follows:
Results
Part I – cover songs
- Kasia Dereń – Satellite
- Alicja Szemplińska – Euphoria
- Albert Černý – Fairytale
Part II – entries for Eurovision 2020
- Albert Černý – Lucy (feat. Lake Malawi)
- Alicja Szemplińska – Empires
- Kasia Dereń – Count on Me
Final result
- Alicja Szemplińska – 10 points, 5 jury, 5 televote
- Albert Černý – 4 points, 2 jury, 2 televote
- Kasia Dereń – 2 points, 1 jury, 1 televote
What you should know about the Polish representative?
Eurovision 2020 Poland: the second finalist of „Szansa na Sukces” is Alicja Szemplińska
Alicja Szemplińska could be heard for the first time in a short-lived format for young performers, Hit, Hit, Hurra!. Thanks to winning it she had the opportunity to practice her skills under the eye of Michael Jackson’s vocal teacher, Seth Riggs. Her more recent successes include winning the 10th edition of The Voice of Poland and of course Szansa na Sukces. Eurowizja 2020. She had entered the national final from episode two, singing the Polish Eurovision entry from 1994, To nie ja! by Edyta Górniak. Her own entry, Empires, is a joint work of Patryk Kumór, Dominic Buczkowski-Wojtaszek and Laurell Barker. First two of them have been involved in Poland’s recent victories at JESC, Buczkowski-Wojtaszek in 2019 and Kumór both in 2018 and 2019. Laurell Barker is a writer or co-writer of a number of previous Eurovision songs, including Luca Hänni’s „She got me”. Is Alicja heading for another victory?
Poland and Eurovision: history
Poland’s debut at Eurovision remains to this day the country’s best result. Edyta Górniak was then the runner-up of the 1994 Eurovision Song Contest in Dublin with To nie ja!. Last year, Poland was represented by the group Tulia, which sang the song Fire of love (Pali się). They have missed a spot in the Grand Final by just two points. The group’s participation marked Poland’s second non-qualification in the row. Can [Kasia Dereń/Alicja Szemplińska/Albert Černý] break this losing streak, or even change the course of history? Share your thoughts in the comments!
Source: TVP, eurowizja.org