Portugal: RTP reveals the Festival da Canção 2023 competing composers

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The Portuguese national broadcaster, RTP, has released the names of the composers that will be taking part in the 2023 Festival da Cançao.
Portugal will be selecting once again their Eurovision hopeful through the Festival da Cançao in which a total of 20 songs will be competing in the next edition.
RTP announced this afternnon during the tv program A Nossa Tarde on RTP1 the 20 composers that will be competing in the next Festival da Cançao, out of which five were selected from the public submissions while the rest 15 were invited directly be RTP. Initially the invitation were sent to 16 composers with one of them withdrawing eventually due to personal reasons nad his spot was filled in by one extra public submission.
Namely, the 20 composers are:
- André Henriques
- April Ivy
- Bandua
- Bárbara Tinoco
- Churky
- Cláudia Pascoal
- Dapunksportif
- Edmundo Inácio (from public submissions)
- Inês Apenas (from public submissions)
- Ivandro
- Jacinta
- Mimicat (from public submissions)
- MOYAH (from public submissions)
- NEOH SOHO
- Quim Albergaria
- SAL
- Teresinha Landeiro
- The Happy Mess
- Voodoo Marmalade (public submissions)
- You Can’t Win Charlie Brown
Among the composers we see Cláudia Pascoal who has represented Portugal on home soil in Eurovision 2018 with the song 'O jardim'
The 2023 edition of Festival da Cançao
According to the released terms and rules of Festival da Cançao 2023, the competition will consist of two semifinals and one grand final show. A total of 20 songs will compete in the Portuguese national selection, 16 will be selected through RTP's direct invitations to composers and 4 from the public submissions.
The Portuguese broadcaster had opened the submission window for next year's edition up to October 21, 2022. Ten entries will compete in each semi-final with six of them winning the ticket to the final. Thus, a total of 12 songs will give the final battle for the right to represent Portugal at Eurovision 2023. All results will be determined by a combination of jury and public voting.
RTP will confirm the dates, the venue and the hosts for the next Festival da Cançao in due course.
Portugal in Eurovision
Portugal joined the Eurovision family in 1964 when it was represented by António Calvário, who finished last without any points. Since their debut in 1964 Portugal has missed five times the contest, the latest was in 2016 and has competed in total 51 times in the competition. Before 2016, the best result of Portugal in the contest was a 6th placing in 1996 with Lúcia Moniz performing “O meu coração não tem cor” in Oslo.
In 2017 the country got its name on the list with the winning countries, as Salvador Sorbal was crowned winner in Kyiv with his song Amar Pelos Dois . Following Salvador’s win the country hosted the 63rd edition of the contest in Lisbon.
In 2020 Elisa won the national final with "Medo de sentir" but eventually never had the chance to perform on the Eurovision stage as the contest was cancelled due to the covid-19 outbreak. In 2021 the group The Black Mamba won the 55th edition of the Festival da Cançao with the song 'Love is on my Side' which competed in the 2nd Semi final and after qualifying to the Grand final finished 12th with 153 points on the overall scoreboard.
Earlier this year , MARO, won Festival Da Cancao 2022 singing 'Saudade, Saudade' and represented the nation in Turin where she finished 9th in the Grand final.
News Source /Image: RTP