1967 - Italy - Non Pensare A Me
- Claudio Villa |
During
the rehearsals it was discovered that this song had been
released too early, and it was replaced with another song by
the same artist. |
1968 - Norway - Jag
Har Aldri Vćrt Sĺ Glad I No'en Som Deg - Odd Borre |
This song swept the Norwegian
final but was swiftly removed when the similarities to
Cliff's "Summer Holiday" were at first listen
blindingly obvious, especially when the saintly Cliff was
actually one of Odd's opponents in 1968!. |
1974 - France - La Vie A Vingt-Cinque Ans
- Dani |
This song featured
in the previews and was withdrawn days before the contest
after the sudden death of
President Pompidou. |
1974 - Malta - Peace To
The World - Enzo Gusman |
This was chosen in a
national final but Malta then withdrew for financial
reasons. |
1976 - Germany - Der Star - Tony Marshall |
Disqualified because it had
been previously performed in public. |
1976 - Liechtenstein
- Little Cowboy - Biggi Bachmann |
Was chosen but the Alpine
nation didn't have a TV station so was ineligible. |
1976 - Malta - Sing Your
Song Country Boy - Enzo Gusman |
Two years on Enzo was about
to get his chance but again the Maltese withdrew and would
not grace the Eurovision stage again for another fifteen
years. |
1978 - Greece - Mr Nobel
- Anna Vissi |
After winning the
Thessaloniki Song Festival, Anna was selected to represent
Greece in Paris. However she was replaced by another
artist as the head of Greek TV (ERT) apparently didn't like
her song. Putting this setback aside, Ms Vissi has
since become a Eurovision legend, performing twice for
Greece and once for her native Cyprus. |
1979 - Turkey - Seviyorum - Maria Rita Epik & Grup 21
Peron |
Was selected as the
Turkish entry, but the contest was in Jerusalem and other
Arabic nations persuaded Turkey to withdraw. |
1980 - Israel - Pizmon
Chozer - Ha'ahum ve Ha'ahayot |
Chosen as the
Israeli entry but the Dutch hosts scheduled the 1980 contest
to coincide with Remembrance Day in Israel so was withdrawn. |
1982 - Greece - Sarantapente
Kopelles - Themis Adamantidis |
Selected by Greece,
who subsequently withdrew from the contest. NB. the singer
bore no relation to the British New Romantic star of the
time. |
1984 - Israel
-
Balalaika -
Ilanit
|
Ilanit sang for Israel in
both 1973 (their debut) and 1977, however her third
appearance was not to be as Israel withdrew due to the
contest clashing with the Yom Hazikaron Remembrance Day. |
1985
- Belgium -
Vannache -
Mireille Capelle |
Was originally selected but
Mireille was unhappy with the lyrics and insisted they be
replaced wholesale by a set she preferred, when the TV
station refused she pulled out (with the song). |
1985 - Yugoslavia -
Pokora - Zorica Konza |
This was selected to go to
Gothenburg but Yugoslav TV pulled out of the contest due to
it clashing with the anniversary of Tito's death. |
1986 - Greece - Wagon-Lit - Polina |
Selected by Greece,
who subsequently withdrew from the contest because the date
clashed with a religious festival. |
1988 - Cyprus - Thimame - Yiannis Demetriou |
Finished
3rd in the 1984
Cypriot final, then won the internal selection for 1988. Doh!
Was included on the then-annual Norwegian "unofficial"
compilation album with the other 1988 entries. |
1990 - Austria - Das Beste
- Duett |
Won the National final but was
discovered to have been entered in the 1988 German heats, dq. |
1992 - Switzerland - Soleil Soleil
- Geraldine Olivier |
Was rejected as a French
language entry to the Swiss final but then won as a German
sung entry. The French Swiss complained and was DQ. |
1997 - Greece An Den
Agapissis Den Tha Agapissi
-
Dimosthenis Stringlis |
This was selected but Greek TV demanded that
the composer be replaced by another singer. Stringlis
refused so the song was ditched. |
1999 - Bosnia - Starac I More
- Hari Mata Hari |
One month after
winning the final it was discovered that the song had been
released in Finland two years earlier by a different singer.
The singer went on to finish third at Eurovision in 2006. |
1999 - Germany - Den Kindern Einfach Zu
- Corinna May |
The winning song had been
released on a single in 1997 by another singer. Corinna
went on to represent Germany in 2002. |
2002 - Lithuania - We All - B'Avarija |
Was withdrawn when it
emerged
that a Lithuanian language version of the song had been
released in 2001. Lithuania's replacement finished second
last. |
2004 - France - L'aissez
Moi Le Temps - Jonathan Cerrada |
French television announced this as the entry
but it was very soon replaced with another song by the same
artist. |
2005 - Lebanon - Quand Tout
S'Enfuit - Aline Lahoud |
Was forced to
withdraw when Lebanese television could not guarantee
transmitting the Israeli entry. |
2005 - Belarus - Boy And Girls
- Angelica
Agurbash |
Was
totally arbitrarily withdrawn by the Belarussians (and
replaced with another song from the same singer) due to bad
reviews on internet sites (!). |
2006 - Serbia &
Montenegro - Moja Ljubavi - No Name |
This Montenegran
song won the 2005 national final but Serbian TV protested
that the voting of Montenegran jurors was partisan and
proposed a second final with different voting. Montenegran
TV believed that their song had won fairly and squarely.
The two sides could not agree before the entry deadline so
Serbia & Montenegro withdrew from the contest. |
2006 - France -
Nous C'est Vous - Virginie Pouchin |
The French song
for 2006 was commissioned from a top French songwriter. Many
weeks later after a bewilderingly long talent show the
singer was chosen. It became clear quite soon that the song
and singer were not well suited. After a short impasse the
songwriter came up with a brand new song! |
2009 -
Hungary - If You Wanna Party - Márk Zentai |
After an
internal trawl through submitted songs, Hungarian chose to
send Mark to Moscow with an upbeat Europop tune, only for it
to come to light just days later that the song had been
released with different lyrics in Sweden in 2005!. |
2009 -
Hungary - Magányos Csónak - Katya Tompos |
The Hungarian's
next choice was singer/actress Katya with a more
sophisticated ballad, however very soon Ms Tompos decided
that her stage commitments meant she couldn't fulfill the
Moscow gig in May (remember the whole circus lasts about a
fortnight). Rather than select another singer to interpret
the song, the TV station chose a completely different third
entry. |
2009 -
Georgia - We Don't Wanna Put In - Stefane & 3G |
Just months
after the war in South Ossetia, Georgia in a public final
chose to send to Moscow a retro disco number with thinly
veiled digs at Russia and Vladimir Putin. The contest
organizers demanded the lyrics be changed, but Georgian TV
refused and so will not appear in the 2009 contest. |
2010 -
Ukraine - I Love You - Vasily Lazarevich |
One of the most
successful countries of the last decade, Ukraine chose
Vasily very early on and he performed five songs in a
national final. The winning song received almost universal
panning online, and suddenly state broadcaster NTU decided
it had been "unfair" to restrict the final to just one
artist, and withdrew their chosen song. They then rustled
up another completely new televised selection with a vast
array of brand new songs in just a few days (!). |
2010 -
Ukraine - To Be Free - Alyosha |
Ukraines second
televised selection (see entry above!) was won by this
song, yet with hours eagle-eyed fans had uncovered that it
had been released originally two years earlier, breaking one
of the basic rules of Eurovision. Instead of giving the
Oslo ticket to another song in the final, Ukrainian TV
decided that the winning artist would go to the contest with
a fresh song chosen internally that had featured in neither
final. So new ground was broken in contest history as
Ukraine goes to the fifty-fifth contest after presenting
twenty-five songs in TWO televised finals and ditching every
single one for an internal choice!. |
2010 -
Belarus - Far Away - 3 + 2 |
Ahead of
schedule an internal jury announced in late February the
song that would represent "White Russia" in Oslo, news
reports suggested that a "back-up" entry had been also
chosen (why, it was not explained) by another artist. Less
than a month later, after underwhelming internet reaction to
the original song, the ex-Soviet nation announced that
their entry was being replaced, not with the back-up, but
with a new song by the original group. |
2011 -
Belarus - Born in Byelarussia - Anastasia Vinnikova |
This song was
unveiled as their song for Dusseldorf by Belarus TV, however
it was deemed to be overtly political, and the lyrics were
tweaked, the new title being "I Am Belarusian". Problem
solved? sadly not. It became clear that the song had been
publicly performed before the cut-off date for entries so it
was DQ'd. |
2012 -
Belarus - All My Life - Alyona Lanskaya |
It almost
wouldn't be a Eurovision selection season without an entry
being replaced in an ex-Soviet republic, and Belarus haven't
let us down!. Of their nine years in the contest this is the
third time they've replaced the originally selected ditty.
Alyona won the televised national final apparently fairly
and squarely, however within a fortnight the president
(that's THE president, not some TV exec) ruled that her
production team had rigged the telephone vote and she was
promptly DQ'd. Imagine the fun if this lot ever get to
host!. |
2012 - Italy
- Per Sempre - Nina Zilli |
We're not sure
if kerfuffle is an Italian word, but after their sensational
return in 2011 after more than a decade's absence, this
years selection has been a little confused. Nina was
selected to represent Italy during the legendary San Remo
Song Festival, but it was announced that it would NOT be
with "Per Sempre", her festival song. A short while
later, national broadcaster RAI said that the song would
indeed be the entry. A week before the entry deadline they
changed their minds and "Per Sempre" was consigned to the
Euro scrap heap, well, per sempre. |
2013 - Belarus
- Rhythm Of Love - Alyona Lanskaya |
For the fourth
year in a row the Belarus entry was replaced. The
original song won the apparent national final in December
2012 but almost immediately it became clear that the singer
and her people were looking for a better ditty, so to the
surprise of no-one this bit the dust in March. |
2013 - Bulgaria
- Kismet - Elitsa & Stoyan |
The duo who
delivered Bulgaria's best result were given a three song
national final, and the combined jury/televote produced a
tied result, then hastily "Kismet" as the televote winner
was declared as the song for Malmo. Barely a week
later it was replaced by the runner-up, apparently due to
"copyright issues". |
2013 - FYR
Macedonia - Imperija - Esma & Lozano |
Unlike their
Bulgarian neighbours, the Macedonians selected internally
for 2013 and after much fanfare the entry was unveiled at
the end of February. However as the entry deadline
loomed rumours grew that the song would be replaced,
ostensibly due to the poor internet reaction, and sure
enough the "Empire" was ditched. |
2015 -
Albania - Diell - Elhaida Dani |
Albania always
pick their entry very early in the Festival I Kenges (a kind
of Balkan San Remo) and Elhaida duly won, however a couple
of months later the composers decided they weren't having
their song sent to Vienna. Thus Elhaida is being furnished
with a brand new song called "I'm Alive". |
2015 -
Germany - Heart Of Stone - Andreas Kummert |
Germany staged
a complex multiple-round national final to select their
entry for Vienna that was convincingly won by Kummert with
over seventy-eight percent of the vote, however at his
moment of triumph on live TV he declined the trip to Austria
leaving runner-up Ann Sophie to represent Germany at the
sixtieth contest. |
Many thanks to David Allan for additions and a correction to
the list, to Stephen Potts for information re Belarus and to
Sarah Boucher for information re Israel.