Austria – This year’s host broadcaster, ORF, has revealed its plans for the selection of this year’s Austrian act. The act will qualify directly for the grand final on May 23rd 2015 as the host nation. Four live shows will be broadcast, with dates still to be confirmed. Anna F (Singer) and Alex Deutsch (Manager and Singer) will lead the broadcaster in its quest to find a quality entry as part of talent search. ORF has been keen to stress the selection will not follow a classic casting show format this year.
Last year’s winner, Conchita Wurst has indicated that she hopes to be part of the hosting of next year’s grand final, possibly in the green room.
Vienna will host the 2015 Eurovision Song Contest on 19, 21 & 23 May in the Weiner Stadthalle.
Source: Austrian Press Agency
The Eurovision Times 
We need a rule that if a broadcaster selects an their entry through a national final, then the selection has to take place over 2 shows max.
No need for 4, 5, or even 10 shows to select an act. Have some mercy on the viewers.
Sad news.Lynsey De Paul(UK 1977)died at 64: http://esctoday.com/87744/united-kingdom-lynsey-de-paul-dies-age-64/
May she rest in peace! Rock Bottom is one of my favourites from that year.
Montenegro opts for an internal selection while Ireland will have a national final the form of which will be revealed on October 13.The current format may be used again.it’s not really working,imo but it gave us the WTF scene of the 2014 national finals season.
The austrian interest in esc is up obviously, which is encouraging.
But mainly I came to the site today to say RIP Lynsey De Paul :( Their entry was a bit ahead of its time in 1977 imo.
I remember liking their NF a couple of years ago. But don’t exactly remember when. Maybe the year they sent Trackshittaz?
Both 2011 and 2012 nf were great, except for their results (Trackshittaz was in grand final in 2011 to Nadine and in 2012 to Conchita)… but it showed that, after the German win, Austria was seeking, looking for a big renewal of interest in the contest, disappointed with the way Austrians were picking in NF (2012 must have hurt them a lot), they went with something more sophisticated in 2013 (smaller, cozier nf) but it only had averagy songs, and the most mainstream won, and got lost in the contest. So they went for the big wow internally in 2014 and won…
Both 2011 and 2012 were very fun national finals and great shows,2011 especially,imo.
Off topic :
“The Sirens” are out ! :
I love it. How can this band not have a single bad song so far ?
I loved their national finals in 2011 and 2012 but strongly disagreed with the winning acts. Viel Glück, Nachbarn!
According to a Polish site,Poland will most likely take part in esc.They are now negotiating with EBU because they want a reduction on the fees they’re paying.They will most probably opt for an internal selection again.
Conchita at France 2: http://esctoday.com/87792/austria-conchita-man/
There’s a debate going on in Iceland atm because of a controversial rule RUV decided to implement with regard to its eurovision selection.My sources are Icelandic sites so i’ll write what i was able to make out of all this.RUV decided that at least 50% of the songs that will make it to the semifinals must have a woman included in their song-writing team.I’m not sure whether the rule will be implemented this year or in 2016.
In response to this rule,many male artists have argued that it’s wrong and it should only be about the best songs no matter if it’s written by a man or a woman.On the other side,female artists like Greta Salome believe that the music industry is male dominated so any change that would work as an incentive for women to sit down and write music is positive.
What do the people in the site think?I think it’s an interesting topic to discuss.Maybe,have a separate article about it too?
Forget songwriting, there should be a rule that 80% of Eurovision participants should be beautiful women. LOL
All joking aside, I hate quotas and rules that say that a percentage of something has to be set aside. Sweden had something similar last year.
Believe me, nobody on this earth wants more women involved in Eurovision more than me, but you can’t legislate such things.
I agree.You do realize that the rule refers to female song-writers and not performers(?)
Yes i know. That is why I started the joke with “forget songwriting”