Russia: RTR confirms participation in Eurovision 2016

by Sanjay (Sergio) Jiandani 5,332 views

Russian national broadcaster RTR (Rossija 1) has confirmed to ESCToday that Russia will participate at the forthcoming 2016 Eurovision Song Contest in Stockholm next year.

Thus Russia is the 35th country to confirm its participation at the upcoming 61st Eurovision Song Contest scheduled to be held at the Ericsson Globe Arena in Stockholm.

The period for countries to apply for participation at the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest concluded on 15 September. Hereafter applicant countries have a grace period until 10 October to decide if they are to stay or not in the competition without facing a financial penalty. So far a total of 35 countries have confirmed their intention to participate at next year’s Eurovision extravaganza.

RTR is yet to determine the mechanism it will use to select the 2016 Russian Eurovision entry and act for Stockholm. More details will be disclosed in the coming months.

In 2015 Polina Gagarina was selected internally to fly the Russian flag at the Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna with her entry A million voices. She achieved an honorable 2nd place in the grand final.

Russia debuted at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1994 and has won the event once in 2008 with Dima Bilan’s Belive. The country sucessfully hosted the contest in 2009 in Moscow.

The 2016 Eurovision Song Contest is scheduled to be held on 10, 12 and 14 May at the Globe Arena, Stockholm in Sweden.

Stay tuned to ESCToday for the latest news on Russia and the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest.