Overnight, Rádio e Televisão de Portugal (RTP) have announced the 20 artists and songs that will compete in this year’s Festival da Canção. The contest has been used as the selection process for the Eurovision Song Contest since 1964, (except for a couple of years when Operação Triunfo and internal selections were used in the early 2000s).
The full line-up of songs and artists were announced in each semi-final they will be competing in.
These are the artists and songs competing:
First Semi-Final
Nadine- ‘Cheguei aqui’
Fábia Maia- ‘Dia lindo’
Sara Afonso- ‘Contramão’
Valéria- ‘Na mais profunda saudade’
IAN- ‘Mundo’
Irma- ‘Livros’
Karetus & Romeu Bairos- ‘Saudade’
Miguel Marôco- ‘Girassol’
Mema- ‘Claro como água’
The Black Mamba- ‘Love Is on My Side’
Second Semi-Final
Carolina Deslandes- ‘Por um triz’
Da Chick- ‘I Got Music’
Joana Alegre- ‘Joana do mar’
Graciela- ‘A vida sem acontecer’
NEEV- ‘Dancing in the Stars’
EU.CLIDES- ‘VOLTE-FACE’
Pedro Gonçalves- ‘Não vou ficar’
Tainá- ‘Jasmim’
Ariana- ‘Mundo melhor’
Ana Tereza- ‘Com um abraço’
A YouTube playlist of the songs can be found here.
The qualifying songs from each semi will be decided by votes from the jury and the public. Five artists will qualify from each semi. The semi-finals will be held on February 20 and 27, with the final to take place on March 6. Filomena Cautela who hosted the Eurovision Song Contest in 2018 will again co-host the final with Vasco Palmeirim. The green room will again be hosted Inês Lopes Gonçalves.
18 of the composers were invited by the broadcaster, while Miguel Marôco and Pedro Gonçalves were selected via an open call with their self penned compositions. 693 submissions were received. This is the record number of submissions for the contest.
Although debuting in 1964, Portugal have only won Eurovision once. That was with Salvador Sobral in 2017 and his jazz waltz song ‘Amar pelos dois’. Last year, Elisa was selected to represent Portugal with the song ‘Medo de sentir’ before the contest's cancellation.
As the 2020 semi-final line-ups were confirmed to stay for 2021, Portugal will compete in the second half of semi-final 2 in Rotterdam on May 20.