Romania: Ester Peony wins Selecţia Naţională 2019 and the ticket to Tel Aviv
After two semi-finals and tonight's final of Selecţia Naţională 2019, Romania's 20th Eurovision participant was found: Ester Peony with her song "On a Sunday"
Another national selection came to an end a little while ago in Romania.
The Romanian broadcaster TVR held Selecţia Naţională 2019 live from Sala Polivalentă in Bucharest, with 12 songs competing for the ticket to Eurovision Song Contest 2019 in Tel Aviv. The 12 songs were qualifiers from Semi-final 1 and Semi-final 2 held the previous weeks.
In tonight's final, a 6-person jury practically decided the winner: Ester Peony will represent Romania in Tel Aviv with the song On a Sunday.
Ester's song On a Sunday is written by Alexandru Șerbu, Ioana Victoria Badea and Ester herself.
Selecţia Naţională 2019 – Result
- Ester Peony – "On a Sunday" (65 points, jury-winner)
- Laura Bretan – "Dear Father" (60 points, tele-winner)
- Bella Santiago – "Army of Love" (58 points)
- Linda Teodosiu – "Renegades" (42 points)
- Letiția Moisescu and Sensibil Balkan – "Daina" (40 points)
- Vaida – "Underground" (35 points)
- Trooper – "Destin" (29 points)
- Olivier Kaye – "Right Now" (27 points)
- Claudiu Mirea – "We Are the Ones" (19 points)
- Aldo Blaga – "Your Journey" (14 points)
- Dya and Lucian Colareza – "Without You (Sin ti)" (10 points)
- Teodora Dinu – "Skyscraper" (7 points)
Ester Peony
Ester Alexandra Crețu, known by the stage name: Ester Peony, is a Romanian-Canadian singer and songwriter.
She was born and raised in Montréal, Canada, and has been playing music and singing since childhood.
In 2014 Ester was discovered on YouTube by a Romanian record label, where she was singing covers of famous songs. She released her first EP last year: "Dig It".
Selecţia Naţională 2019
The result of tonight's final was determined by a 6-person jury in combination with televoting. The weight of each jury member was the same as all the public televoters, meaning that the televoters' opinions only counted 14,2% in the combined result.
The Jury's favourite was Ester Peony while the public's favourite was Laura Bretan, but because of the low weight of the public televotes, it was Ester who won the show.
Two former Eurovision winners were invited as guest acts: Netta (Israel 2018) and Emmelie de Forest (Denmark 2013), whom also was one of the jury members.
In the two semi-finals, held in Iași and Arad, 12 songs competed in each. 5 finalists were selected by a jury while 1 finalist was selected via televoting. The Romanian broadcaster TVR had the option to award one wildcard for the final.
Romania in Eurovision Song Contest
Romania had its debut in 1994, and has been participating 19 times since. They have never won the contest, but came 3rd in 2005 (Luminita Anghel & Sistem - "Let Me Try") and 2010 (Paula Seling & Ovi - "Playing With Fire").
Romania was expelled from Eurovision 2016 due to unpaid dept to EBU, so the winner of Selecţia Naţională 2016, Ovidiu Anton didn't participate in Stockholm.
Since the introductions of semi-finals in 2004, Romania has qualified to the Grand Final 13 out of 14 times, only missed the 2018 qualification.
