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Jury is back
Slovenia: New selection format for Eurovision
Like last year, EMA, the annual Slovenian competition to decide the country's Eurovision- representative, will be held in February. But as far as the rules are concerned, there will be some slight changes. The two semi finals will be reduced to one with 14 participating acts.
RTVSLO is going to invite six songwriters through an internal selection. The invitations will be sent to those songwriters who had the most success on EMA in recent years and celebrated some hits in the Slovenian charts. The invited songwriters themselves will then choose the artist or band who performs their song. Besides the six invited song writers, all other musicians are also invited to submit a song for EMA.
14 acts will eventually compete in the final. It remains open how many songs of the invited artists and how many of the other submitted entries will compete: Maximum six songs of the invited songwriters can compete in the final and at least eight songs by the other musicians will qualify. The invited authors are automatically qualified for the final if they submit a song.
Another crucial point is the altered voting procedure. The voting consists of a mix of televoting (lines will be open for ten minutes) and an expert jury (50: 50) appointed by RTVSLO.
Contrary to the last two years, there won't be a superfinal anymore- it's going to be only one voting round. Slovenian superfinals were very exciting in the past as the acts placing second in the first round eventually won the superfinal. In 2007, Alenka Gotar placed second in the first voting round only a few votes behind Eva Cerne. But in the superfinal, Alenka won against Eva by a landslide with an impressive amount of votes and thus got the ticket to Eurovision. This year, EMA had the closest result ever with Rebeka Dremelj winning over Langa in Civili with only 395 votes separating them.
However, the presence of jury voting has already led to some controversy in previous editions of EMA as the jury often completely ignored the public's choice. The biggest uproars were caused in 2006, when Anzej Dezan won over Sasa Lendero in 2006 and when Sestre won over Karmen Stavec in 2002. Both Sasa and Karmen had massive support of the Slovenian public which protested heavily against the results.
It is yet to be seen which artists will participate in EMA 2009 or if there are any possible returns of former participants. A lot of new faces are expected though.
Stay tuned to esctoday.com for more information.
An article by Florian G.
Special thanks to Katja Vidojevic for her assistance.
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Hmmm...juries back? Well it might be a a good idea. If they are NOT corrupt. In recent EMA's it seems like the juries have chosen a favourite in advance, and then go trhough fire and water to get it chosen. Look at the juries votes composed to what the televoters have chosen. Moreover, an expert jury (?) who once selected a drag act to represent their country, hardly represent something that spawns crediblity and respect among general viwers - to put it mildly!
I think recent Slovene entries haven't been very good. Sorry. They had a wonderfully sophsticated pop song in 93.But after that it went downhill. Already in 95 they went the very cliched eurobanalballad route. In the 00s? Hmm...so many cheesy, kitschy songs...08, 06, 03, 02 etc. Only Omar Naber has really represented pure class in recent years. A shame, sometimes the EMAs have been very good....07, 05, 04, 03 etc. I hope they go for rock or rnb next year. Have been some good songs of that kind in their national finals.
I think the jury is a bad choice, since they have always ignored the Slovene audience. In 2002 when they chose Sestre instead of Karmen, in 2004 when Natalija Verboten won the televoting and got nothing from the jury (that's why she wasn't in the final) and the most infamous one was of course in 2006. They will have a scandal again.
Good luck slovenija! i really hope u get a good result soon. for me slovenija is one of the most kick ass countries in europe! il never forget how much fun i had in ljubljana and how awesome the people are!! thnx for all the great memories 
poor lil slovenija tho i agree shouldnt be considered part of ther balkan block, she receives shit all from the rest of ther bloc
Hope Slovenia the best of lucks. I loved their entries in 2007 & 2008, so they deserve to win soon... GOOD LUCK, and 0 pts to Eastern countries
I agree totally.... It's a joke, and I don't think that juries will change that....
The point is that Slovenia is not considered a Balkan country by many so it doesn't belong to the "Balkan voting block". For example, Croatia is one of few countries which always gives some points to Slovenia, but not many, because 12, 10 and 8 points are already reserved for "real Balkan countries", like Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Macedonia....Sometimes it makes me angry to which degree the voting results of Croatian televoters are predictable last years.
Why is that, that Slovenia as only Balka country, can not get lots of neighbour votes ? For me Slovenia had some really good entries.
1995 : Prisluhni mi : Darja Svajger (did do quite well)
2001 : Energy : Nusa
2005 : Stop : Omar Naber
2006 : Mr Nobody : Anzej Dezan
2007 : Cvet z juga
Of all these, Omar is my favorite. So good luck Slovenia
I like Slovenian entries almost every year, but the placement they achieve disappoints me regularly. I think that Slovenia is one of the most underrated countries at ESC. They simply can't count on neighbour countries or diaspora voting....
That Omar Nader did not reached the final was a shame....I loved that song and his performance very very much.... I presume juries back because of the change in the festival aswell. But he we know that juries only get into the picture in the final, so I think Slovenia will struggle once again to reach that final.
Thank you, drusus 1 !
And about Sasa, she was originally supposed to get 6 points (way to little but it would have been enough to win) from the jury but Molk changed it into a big, fat 0. 
I am really wondering who of the good artists will participate when the juries return. It's such a pity.
Let's hope history won't be repeat itself.
@Jonny K. - The slovenian jury awarded Sasa's Mandoline with zero points, despite being the fav. of the televoters. There can't be a better prove for a boykott cause no one actually tells me that the song and performance weren't worth a single point ! And that Misa Molk wanted a boykott against Natalija Verboten's " Cry on my shoulder " just because she don't like her, is also quite sure.
But anyway, even if the return of Sasa or Alenka seems unlikely now, I wish the best for Slovenia - maybe the jury changed and just votes for songs.
And I would also like to thank Florian for his article and ongoing interest in Slovenia & the EMA.
I'm not sure whether this is a good or bad thing. But from reading stories about the juries in 2002 and 2006, its probably a bad thing 
Juries can work very well unless there is a massive difference between the opinion of the Jury and the public, eg Eurolaul 2003. In Eurolaul 2003 Vanilla Ninja were the runaway winners with the televoters, but the jury placed them last so they didnt' go to Riga.
I think juries are good but with a small input, after with a national final there is no diaspora or anything so the vote is fair, so the fairest and most democratic way to decide a winner is televoting. And juries can be especially bad when they're corrupt or whatever like in EMA 2002
Anyway, good luck to Slovenia And this year, if you send a good song again, DON'T RUIN IT WITH A DODGY DANCE ROUTINE!!! 
@ John W:
Indeed! The public always made the right choice and now they are bringing the juries back, it's horrible!
I wonder who will participate like this, Sasa for sure not!
Lest we forget that in the last few years, the Slovenian public when voting on their own have produced Alenka Gotar, the only Slovene to qualify for the final in 5 years, and Omar Naber and Rebeka Dremelj who only just missed out. The "jury assisted" choices, Platin and Anzej, came nowhere near, and as for Karmen, well we all know what happened to her...
@ Angel of Doubt:
In connection with the artists who perform the songs new faces are expected.
I see this article is by Florian.
Somewhere in the end, there is written that a lot of new faces are expected. Do you know if they mean that by the authors or by the other 14 songs?
I would really like to know that.
The bad news - the jury will be back. Those who know the slovenian jury, Misa Molk and thier famous " boykotts " against Natalija Verboten and Sasa Lendero surely know why it is bad news indeed.
The good news would have been the six " invited " composers by RTSLO cause A. Babic would surely be one of them. I just doubt he'll return with the horrible jury returning to the EMA after his last Lendero entry ( which later won the OGAE Second Chance Contest for Slovenia ) being so obviously boykotted by the jury despite being the best entry. So the good news might turn into bad news too !
I think a jury makes sense. Juries will vote in the Eurovision final now so they'll want to make sure they send a song both juries and the public will vote for.
Yes, that's a good idea - especially when we look back to 2006 - the Slovenians sent an extraordinarily ordinary act instead of a certain Top5-aspirant because of their jury...
Very clever, EMA, it seems that it is now time to bring back the "good old days", heh...?
I adore Slovenia I've liked all their entries .... Especially Rebeka Dremelj , Nusa Derenda , Omar Naber and Alenka Gotar ..... Amazing songs 
Looks like jury voting is overtaking Eurovision...anyway good luck to Slovenia...hope they will send good entry for 2009...
@Euro Sheep a.k.a. SexyWool
I love the LJUBLJANA 2010 thing! xD
Jury is a horrible idea. I like the other changes.
Let's hope for more of the same from Slovenia! I have never watched EMA, but this year will see a change for me so I'm looking forward to that!!! They have really impressed me with their entries since 2001 (I would have preferred Rebeka in 2005 as well, but you can't have everything 
) and I just wish them the best of luck!
You never know - Ljubljana 2010?!
Congratulations Slovenia! You were trying very hard from 2005. All songs (2005,2006,2007,2008) were GOOD songs. Just continue doing that and make some great stage performance and you'll be in the final.
Good luck neighbourgs.
Maybe this might give quality artists like Diona Dim a better chance...
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