New readers start here: On Saturday, 26 songs will compete to win the annual Eurovision Song Contest. If you’re already struggling, we’ve put together a handy explanation of the competition.
There have been two semi-finals already, and seventeen potential contenders have been consigned to the loading bay of Lisbon’s Altice Arena. Late last night, the producers huddled to decide who they wanted to win who sings when.
Here is the running order
The commercial breaks will happen after Portugal and Australia to allow set-up of the stage for the UK and Finland.
| Country | Performer | Sample lyric | Concept |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ukraine | Melovin Under the ladder | Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh, yeah | Conjunctivitis |
| Spain | Amaia & Alfred Tu canción | I never got to imagine that traveling to the moon would be for real | Manchego |
| Slovenia | Lea Sirk Hvala, ne | True art cannot have a price tag | Fake break |
| Lithuania | Ieva Zasimauskaitė When we're old | From your very first smile I knew that I’d walk a mile | Early John Lewis Xmas ad |
| Austria | Cesár Sampson Nobody but you | Lord I’m gonna get so high tonight | Hammertime |
| Estonia | Elina Nechayeva La forza | I would like it to be a fairy tale around us | Say yes to the dress |
| Norway | Alexander Rybak That's how you write a a song | Shubidubi-dab-dab Shubidubi-dab-dab Shubaduba-hey Shubaduba-hey Say | Violin |
| Portugal | Cláudia Pascoal O Jardim | I’ll take care of your garden | High school musical angst |
| UK | SuRie Storm | Am I making you proud or could I do better? | Annie Lennox sings Nicki French |
| Serbia | Sanja Ilić & Balkanika Nova Deca | Happiness is achievable, grab it | Balkania |
| Germany | Michael Schulte You let me walk alone | We were three kids and a loving mum | Sheeran |
| Albania | Eugent Bushpepa Mall | This yearning that burns knows no distance, no bounds in this world | Gruffalo |
| France | Madame Monsieur Mercy | Merci, merci, merci, merci | Turtle necks |
| Czech Republic | Mikolas Josef Lie to me | The way she moved got me making a puddle | Back-brace Bieber |
| Denmark | Rasmussen Higher ground | Call it surrender, still won't feel like defeat | Boaty McBeardface |
| Australia | Jessica Mauboy We got love | Don’t you think it’s just a waste of time when we’re always fighting over material, trivial things in this life? | Drunken auntie at wedding |
| Finland | Saara Aalto Monsters | I’m gonna roll the dice, you better believe it | Gay Nazi chic |
| Bulgaria | Equinox Bones | Love is like a black hole | Sia +4 |
| Moldova | DoReDoS My lucky day | And something tells me we ain’t gonna loose it | Flatpack fun |
| Sweden | Benjamin Ingrosso Dance you off | I dug you like you were treasure | Tanning salon |
| Hungary | AWS Viszlát Nyár | My blood will keep running in your veins | The one with all the shouting |
| Israel | Netta Toy | You're stupid just like your smart phone | Family bag of Skittles, two litres of Fanta |
| Netherlands | Waylon Outlaw in 'em | A new tattoo that you can’t keep hidden | Blacksploitation |
| Ireland | Ryan O'Shaughnessy Together | We were drifting like two icebergs out on the ocean | Snowbound gayzers |
| Cyprus | Eleni Foureira Fuego | You got me pelican fly-fly-flyin' | Yeah, yeah, fire |
| Italy | Ermal Meta & Fabrizio Moro Non mi avete fatto niente | In London it always rains | Ill-judged holiday romance that won't stop calling |
The show begins on Saturday at 20:00 UK time (21:00 CET) and you can watch it on your telly box, or here online.
Live blogs
Tonight, Mr Phil will talk you through the jury final. Tomorrow, Mo Fanning will be on hand for those who need emotional support – along with cocktail and snack suggestions – with our last LIVE BLOG of the season.
[…] Here's a list of all the songs so you know what to expect […]
[…] 20,000 Spanish fans may, however, be disappointed by their result. As we poured over the running order in the early hours of Friday morning, we saw they were singing in the ill-fated second position, […]
Hey all. Been following and enjoying the reports from Lisbon over the last two weeks. Keep up the good work.
Some very interesting choices in that running order.
1- From a look at this it seems that they are setting it up for Cyprus in a big way. They knew they couldn’t put it last again so one from last is as close as they could get. I’m not ruling out Israel either given it’s late draw but I think it coming after Sweden blows Benji’s chances out of the water and I don’t think the EBU would have any problem with that.
2- Even more startling is that in the first half we have all the favourites – Lithuania, Austria, Estonia and Norway – in one super block. That seems a very controversial choice as there’s plenty of songs they could have used to spread them out, To me this is very much an attempt to dilute the effectiveness of those songs in favour of what comes later.
3 – Finally the choice of Ukraine as an opener is a bit strange given the weird nature of the song and the staging. There’s quite a chance of putting casual viewers off right at the start of the show. While I knew they couldn’t have Norway open again they could have opted for Austria or the UK to kick things off as both are good strong upbeat songs with straightforward staging.
Of course you never know how things turn out but the Eastern Med (Cyprus/Israel) next May is looking like a strong possibility.
Ukraine is an odd opener, especially since he starts entombed in his coffin, but I suppose it is Eurovision …