Bilal Hassani is the king of Destination Eurovision, winning with his song “Roi” and will be heading to Tel Aviv in May to represent France at the 2019 Eurovision Song Contest.
Destination Eurovision featured eighteen acts who each performed in one of two semi-finals, with four from each semi-final advancing to the grand final which took place on Saturday.
The winner was decided by a 50/50 jury and public vote. It was a closely fought contest with Bilal only sitting in fifth place after the jury vote. The public vote, however, changed the entire leaderboard on its head. After gaining more than double the points of his nearest competitor in the televote, Bilal stormed to victory, taking the Destination Eurovision crown.
You can watch Bilal perform “Roi” in the grand final of Destination Eurovision below:
France first entered the Eurovision Song Contest in the very first year of the competition back in 1956. Through the years they have won the contest five times: in 1958, 1960, 1962, 1969 and 1977. However, they haven’t fared quite as well in recent years only making the top ten once this decade in 2016 when Amir’s performance of “J’ai cherché” finished in sixth place. France will be hoping Bilal can return them to their former glory when he performs in Tel Aviv.
As one of the big five, France is already guaranteed a place in the final but to win, Bilal will have to gain the most points out of all the entrants Announced so far are Srbuk for Armenia, Tamta for Cyprus, Jonida Maliqi for Albania, Eliot for Belgium, Miki for Spain, Serhat for San Marino, Duncan Laurence for The Netherlands, Tamara Todevska for FYR Macedonia and Michela Pace for Malta. The other countries are expected to reveal their acts in the forthcoming months.
The 2019 Eurovision Song Contest will be hosted at the Expo Tel Aviv in Israel after Netta won last year with the song “Toy”. The two Semi-Finals will take place on 14 May and 16 May with the Grand Final taking place on 18 May. A total of 42 countries will compete in the contest.