Six artists fought for the 4 tickets that let them continue for the second semi final of the Depi Evratesil selection in Armenia. Only two weeks left only before we will know who will wave the Armenia flag in Kyiv, Ukraine in May next year.
Depi Evratesil (To Eurovision) is the national final organised by broadcaster AMPTV that will select the artist who will represent Armenia at the Eurovision Song Contest 2017. After months of auditions, music battles and difficult decision from the judges, today it was the first time that the show was broadcast live. The viewers from their homes could vote through SMS.
Six former Armenian Eurovision participants were the jury panel of Depi Evratesil. During the show each judge made a team of contestants. Only one artist left per team. So after tonight’s first semi final, two judges were left without artists in their team, as only 4 qualified to the next round of the selection.
The six contestants
- Anush Arshakyan – Martha
Martha opened the show performing Beyonce’s Naughty Girl. She was all in a black impressive kind of dress and clear red lipstick. The song didn’t expose her true vocals, however the performance itself was energetic with lots of dancing and seductive moves.
- Essai – Artsvik
Second contestant is Artsvik. Artsvik has already taken part in The Voice of Russia. Artsvik sang Christina Aguilera’s Hurt. The stage was all covered in smoke. judges were singing along with her. Artsvik was wearing a nice white dress and a crown to match the outfit covered in pieces of jewellery. A very strong performance and big applause from the audience.
- Hayko – Egine
Egine sang Fergie’s A Little Party Never Killed Nobody and this was the first dancing song of the night. She performed with four male dances. A lot of dancing between singing. Her vocals have been improved since the beginning of Depi Evratesil, however she might be one of the two contestants that will be eliminated today.
- Aram MP3 – Lucy
Lucy is maybe the favourite to win Depi Evratesil. Lucy a song that composed herself, Turn Around. It’s an uptempo ballad but with a repetitive chorus. Her vocals weren’t so good, and her stage presentation was very meretricious. Lucy wore a beige coat, jean shorts and a red shirt, walking back and front, with the official video of the song in the background.
- Inga Arshakyan – Syuzanna Melqonyan
Syuzanna sang a french song! Lara Fabian’ s Je Suis Malade. She wore a black dress and a black cape. A very classy presentation and another ballad. Very strong vocals and an absolutely emotional performance with snow in the background. Her outfit and her whole style reminded a bit of Moran Mazor, the Israeli representative in Eurovision 2013. Huge applause and maybe the strongest appearance of the night.
- Iveta Mukuchyan – Vahe Aleksanyan
Vahe is the only male singer of this first semi-final line up. He sang Sam Smith’ s Writing’s On The Fall. Fire were used in the background. He wore a black suit. Vahe has a very unique voice and this helped him to stand out. A female dancer was with him on stage. They ended the song together in the middle of the stage.
The show
The first semi-final of Depi Evratesil took place in AMPTV’ s studio. Gohar Gasparyan was the host of the semi final as in the previous heats. The show started immediately with the 6 artists performing the songs they chose to compete.
After the end of the performances we saw a small recap with the voting numbers people should call and send sms to vote.
In addition to the performances of the competing artists, the interval act featured 2016 Junior Eurovision Armenian entrants Anahit & Mary with their song Tarber, which ended second.
After all the performances we saw a video recap with the telephone numbers people from their homes should use if they wanted to vote After that a small video with the history of the show until now.
Before the results all contestants sang with their coaches-judges a duet.
Results
Top 4 was selected by a 50/50 combination of public votes and 9 professional juries. The viewers and the juries each had a total of 189 points to award. Each jury distributed his/her points from 1 to 6. Televoting was based on the percentage of votes each song achieved through SMS voting.
| Draw | Judge | Artist | Song | Jury | Televote | Total | Place | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Percentage | Points | |||||||
| 1 | Anush | Martha | “Naughty Girl” | 48 | 25.9% | 49 | 97 | 1 |
| 2 | Essaï | Artsvik | “Hurt” | 32 | 20.6% | 39 | 71 | 2 |
| 5 | Inga | Syuzanna Melqonyan | “Je suis malade” | 31 | 19.1% | 36 | 67 | 3 |
| 3 | Hayko | Egine | “A Little Party Never Killed Nobody (All We Got)” | 25 | 17.5% | 33 | 58 | 4 |
| 6 | Iveta | Vahe Aleksanyan | “Writing’s on the Wall” | 33 | 7.9% | 15 | 48 | 5 |
| 4 | Aram Mp3 | Lucy | “Turn Around” | 20 | 9% | 17 | 37 | 6 |
The four that qualified for next Saturday’s second semi final of Depi Evratesil are:
- Martha
- Artsvik
- Syuzanna
- Egine
Armenia at the Eurovision Song Contest
The country debuted at the contest in 2006 and have been among the most succesful countries only failing once to reach the final. That was in 2009 where Emmy sang Boom Boom.
Though Armenia is yet to win the Eurovision Song Contest, they have only twice finished outside top 10. Their best placements is two 4th places, in 2008 by Sirusho and in 2014 by Aram MP3.
At the 2016 contest the country was represented by Iveta Mukuchyan who finished 7th with the song LoveWave. That entry you can relive below:
