After a nail-biting final on Saturday night, Victor Crone has emerged the winner of Eesti Laul 2019 and will, therefore, be heading to Tel Aviv in May to represent Estonia at the 2019 Eurovision Song Contest.
Eesti Laul featured twenty-four acts who each performed in one of two semi-finals, with six from each semi-final advancing to the grand final which took place on Saturday night.
In the grand final, the twelve competing artists each performed before a jury and the viewing public in a bid to advance to the final round of the competition – the super final. The initial vote of the night was decided by a 50/50 jury and public vote and although being an early fan favourite, Victor did not have an easy ride to victory. After the juries vote, Victor found himself down in ninth place and it looked like he might not make it into the super final.
However, the public vote changed everything. The public loved Victor’s performance and he found himself winning their vote. This meant that he found himself in the top three overall, alongside Stefan and Uku Suviste. The three then advanced to the super final and the voting lines opened again. This time, the vote was purely down to the public and Victor once again came out on top, winning the competition and the honour of representing Estonia at the 2019 Eurovision Song Contest.
You can watch the official music video for “Storm” below:
Estonia first entered the Eurovision Song Contest in 1994 and have had mixed fortunes over the years. At the beginning of the millennium, Estonia was on fire with their entries. They won the contest in 2001 with Tanel Padar, Dave Benton and 2XL’s catchy, up-tempo track “Everybody” as well as placing in the top five in both 2000 and 2002. However, since the semi-finals were introduced in 2004 the country has failed to qualify for the final on nine occasions, despite sending fan favourite entries including Koit Toome and Laura’s “Verona”. Estonia will be hoping Victor can “Storm” into the final in Tel Aviv and take them to victory for a second time.
To do this, he will have to compete against acts from forty-one other countries. Announced acts 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 North Macedonia, Michela Pace for Malta, Bilal Hassani for France, Lake Malawi for the Czech Republic, PÆNDA for Austria, Darude feat. Sebastian Rejman for Finland. Michael Rice for the United Kingdom, Sergey Lazarev for Russia, Mahmood for Italy, Kate Miller-Heidke for Australia, D-Moll for Montenegro, Kobi Marimi for Israel and Katerine Duska for Greece. 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.