Song Festival (Discussion)

maddog wrote:

NeonNocturnal wrote:Which country are you?

So over the moon Ukraine and China have returned!

All these returns and débuts are so exciting :)Can't wait to get listening to the entries.

We need mooooooar!
If anyone is on any other esc related sites try and get them on board. This is gonna be an epic contest.

Hey, I decided to join as well with China. I hope you guys enjoy the entry, it's a massive song in China and Taiwan at the moment and I love it. I've listened to a few entries already and I think a lot of people have chosen great entries! I'm really loving this because it's opening my ears up to a lot of countries now. Very exciting!

bondjure wrote:Hey, I decided to join as well with China. I hope you guys enjoy the entry, it's a massive song in China and Taiwan at the moment and I love it. I've listened to a few entries already and I think a lot of people have chosen great entries! I'm really loving this because it's opening my ears up to a lot of countries now. Very exciting!

You picked a really good entry, I like it!

Kimyasimya wrote:

bondjure wrote:Hey, I decided to join as well with China. I hope you guys enjoy the entry, it's a massive song in China and Taiwan at the moment and I love it. I've listened to a few entries already and I think a lot of people have chosen great entries! I'm really loving this because it's opening my ears up to a lot of countries now. Very exciting!

You picked a really good entry, I like it!

Thanks Iden! I really like the song you chose for Iran too. I think it's a strong debut entry.

bondjure wrote:

Kimyasimya wrote:

bondjure wrote:Hey, I decided to join as well with China. I hope you guys enjoy the entry, it's a massive song in China and Taiwan at the moment and I love it. I've listened to a few entries already and I think a lot of people have chosen great entries! I'm really loving this because it's opening my ears up to a lot of countries now. Very exciting!

You picked a really good entry, I like it!

Thanks Iden! I really like the song you chose for Iran too. I think it's a strong debut entry.

Agreed!

Both of yours are good.  

Danger Whale wrote:
Agreed!

Both of yours are good.  

Finland's is pretty good as well

Any chance that this was going to be an easy win for Iran is now gone, there's some real competition

Kimyasimya wrote:

Danger Whale wrote:
Agreed!

Both of yours are good.  

Finland's is pretty good as well

Any chance that this was going to be an easy win for Iran is now gone, there's some real competition

Thank you.

This will be a very interesting contest.

Kimyasimya wrote:

Danger Whale wrote:
Agreed!

Both of yours are good.  

Finland's is pretty good as well

Any chance that this was going to be an easy win for Iran is now gone, there's some real competition

Thank you!

I agree. I also think I don't not like any of the entries to be honest. It's very eclectic and I like eclectic. They are all good in their own little different ways.

Sweden is holding a National Final. Please help them out and vote. Lets encourage national finals for countries which have the ability to hold them! This thing is gonna become an online Eurovision!

Song For Torino

Neon's long-lasting persuasion finally convinced me so I guess I am Brazil now. Oops.
(Also wow it is hard to first study Swedish and then write in English.)

What are your thoughts on languages? Do you select songs in a national language, go for English?, a mix?, or whatever you think is good musically?

maddog wrote:What are your thoughts on languages? Do you select songs in a national language, go for English?, a mix?, or whatever you think is good musically?

I think I've decided to send songs in Iranian languages (Persian, Azeri, Kurdish, etc.) even though English (and apparently Italian) helps a song win in this competition.

SF winners by languages;
English: 9
Italian: 3
French: 1

Pretty interesting figures!

I honestly set out looking for one in the national language, but I stumbled across an English song and just liked it too much.  I don't intend to make a habit of it.

I was going to listen to songs in Portuguese for my Portuguese class anyway so I thought "Why not be Brazil and make some use of the hours I spend on Youtube listening to sertaneja" so here I am. I just really like Portuguese okay.

Also, I find it a bit surprising that English seems to be the dominating language in SF. I'd have thought that (ESC) fans (whom I presume SF participants to mostly be) would embrace the songs in national languages here but guess not then.

iiva wrote:I was going to listen to songs in Portuguese for my Portuguese class anyway so I thought "Why not be Brazil and make some use of the hours I spend on Youtube listening to sertaneja" so here I am. I just really like Portuguese okay.

Also, I find it a bit surprising that English seems to be the dominating language in SF. I'd have thought that (ESC) fans (whom I presume SF participants to mostly be) would embrace the songs in national languages here but guess not then.

I see where you are coming from. I used to be a huge anti-English person in ESC and was determined to carry this over and embrace national languages. However, I have come to learn that it is not always the language which makes a song. It's the music behind it, and if a song sounds good musically, it doesn't matter which language it is in.

Yeah, I judge the song, regardless of language, but I try and make sure that at least every now and then a Norwegian language song is sent.

I'll be honest. I do prefer songs to be reflective of their culture and this includes languages too.
This is purely my own opinion and I don't want to cause any offense, but thus far, the entries in SF with non-English lyrics have mostly been forgettable, not because of the language, but the songs themselves have been dull. If anything, I usually favor songs with languages, but in my view the songs (mostly, not all) have been so dull they haven't been able to benefit from this advantage.

That being said I also think a few delegations have got stuck in a rut of sending dull and low quality entries contest after contest as well, I hope that these people really start to compete. I think everyone really needs to remember the competition part and get competitive. The delegations that consistently do well are ones that will not settle until they have won, many of these countries state so when they submit their entries, they're fighting to win.

After SF14 we only have one more actual SF edition in 2013, let's all pull it out of the bag and make it the most competitive competition to date!

NeonNocturnal wrote:I'll be honest. I do prefer songs to be reflective of their culture and this includes languages too.
This is purely my own opinion and I don't want to cause any offense, but thus far, the entries in SF with non-English lyrics have mostly been forgettable, not because of the language, but the songs themselves have been dull. If anything, I usually favor songs with languages, but in my view the songs (mostly, not all) have been so dull they haven't been able to benefit from this advantage.

That being said I also think a few delegations have got stuck in a rut of sending dull and low quality entries contest after contest as well, I hope that these people really start to compete. I think everyone really needs to remember the competition part and get competitive. The delegations that consistently do well are ones that will not settle until they have won, many of these countries state so when they submit their entries, they're fighting to win.

After SF14 we only have one more actual SF edition in 2013, let's all pull it out of the bag and make it the most competitive competition to date!

Aha, personally, I'm completely the opposite! I found that the songs in non-English languages were my favourite! The English songs didn't do it for me, not because of the English, but just the songs themselves.

It's a personal taste thing, clearly.

A good song transcends language barriers, if you put the effort in you'll be paid back in kine, and I'm pretty sure most of the people in this thread aren't what the problem is in the contest.

If you think that delegations need a kick in the pants then give them a kick in the pants, else next contest I'll make the tagline "sardine garter belts"

*Alex wrote:If you think that delegations need a kick in the pants then give them a kick in the pants, else next contest I'll make the tagline "sardine garter belts"

I think that if we keep letting you win, it will be a kick in the pants enough. The message will get through

Also, results for heat 1 in SF 14 are out

maddog wrote:What are your thoughts on languages? Do you select songs in a national language, go for English?, a mix?, or whatever you think is good musically?

I don't think you should expect an English song from China any time soon. My intention is to showcase Chinese music, to deliver a diverse experience and hopefully people will find some enjoyment in that. However, I would like to say that I enjoyed every single entry! I enjoy listening to music from other countries and I look forward to hearing more, I really do (regardless of language). Everyone has different tastes in music and I'm not one to judge them for it. I say send whatever you want and I will look forward to experiencing it! IT'S AMAZING AND I LOVE YOU ALL!

I am planning to make a Country profile database!
I would need some help with adding the history of countries. The history sections will be created on Google Drive and will look like this.

I could create the pages for all the countries and let people edit them if they're up for helping out. It'd be great to be able to see the history of each individual country and would help statistics discussions and conspiracy theories, which we know we all love in ESC!

I've changed the calendar slightly for the contest.

Before, it would last 4 weeks (Selection (1 week), Heats (1 Week), Second Chance (1 week), Final (1 week))

It will now last 6 weeks (Selection (2 weeks), Heats (2 weeks), Second Chance (1 week), Final (1 Week))

These changes have been made so that people have longer to select their entries or hold national finals. The heats sections has also been extended slightly so that the process doesn't feel rushed. A lot of finalists come from that week and gradually seeing them qualify is more exciting. The finalists will also be announced one-by-one on a scheduled news update.

I'm also hoping the 6-week system makes the contest feel a bit less factory like, it feels sometimes we start as soon as we've finished, making it feel more special will help players and my organization, hopefully.

Also the ABU has had to be cancelled as some of the songs haven't been released still and getting decent quality is also hard.

What do you guys think to these changes?

NeonNocturnal wrote:I've changed the calendar slightly for the contest.

Before, it would last 4 weeks (Selection (1 week), Heats (1 Week), Second Chance (1 week), Final (1 week))

It will now last 6 weeks (Selection (2 weeks), Heats (2 weeks), Second Chance (1 week), Final (1 Week))

These changes have been made so that people have longer to select their entries or hold national finals. The heats sections has also been extended slightly so that the process doesn't feel rushed. A lot of finalists come from that week and gradually seeing them qualify is more exciting. The finalists will also be announced one-by-one on a scheduled news update.

I'm also hoping the 6-week system makes the contest feel a bit less factory like, it feels sometimes we start as soon as we've finished, making it feel more special will help players and my organization, hopefully.

Also the ABU has had to be cancelled as some of the songs haven't been released still and getting decent quality is also hard.

What do you guys think to these changes?

I agree with you about it feeling less factory. Also the idea of revealing each country one at a time is nice and builds suspense