Ukraine was represented at the Eurovision Song Contest 2014 with the song "Tick-Tock", written by Mariya Yaremchuk and Sandra Bjurman, and performed by Yaremchuk herself. The Ukrainian participating broadcaster, National Television Company of Ukraine (NTU), organised a national final in order to select its entry for the contest. Twenty entries competed in the national selection held on 21 December 2013 and "Tick-Tock" performed by Mariya Yaremchuk was selected as the winner following the combination of votes from a five-member jury panel and a public televote.
Ukraine was drawn to compete in the first semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest which took place on 6 May 2014. Performing during the show in position 9, "Tick-Tock" was announced among the top 10 entries of the first semi-final and therefore qualified to compete in the final on 10 May. It was later revealed that Ukraine placed fifth out of the 16 participating countries in the semi-final with 118 points. In the final, Ukraine performed in position 1 and placed sixth out of the 26 participating countries with 113 points.
Background
Prior to the 2014 contest, the National Television Company of Ukraine (NTU) had participated in the Eurovision Song Contest representing Ukraine eleven times since its first entry , winning the contest with the song "Wild Dances" performed by Ruslana. Following the introduction of semi-finals for the 2004, Ukraine had managed to qualify to final in every contest they participated in thus far. Ukraine had been the runner-up in the contest on two occasions: in with the song "Dancing Lasha Tumbai" performed by Verka Serduchka and with the song "Shady Lady" performed by Ani Lorak. Ukraine's least successful result had been 19th place, achieved , with the song "Razom nas bahato" performed by GreenJolly.
As part of its duties as participating broadcaster, NTU organises the selection of its entry in the Eurovision Song Contest and broadcasts the event in the country. The broadcaster confirmed its intentions to participate at the 2014 contest on 23 October 2013. In the past, NTU had alternated between both internal selections and national finals in order to select its entry. Between 2011 and 2013, it had set up national finals with several artists to choose both the song and performer, with both the public and a panel of jury members involved in the selection. The method was continued to select the 2014 entry.
Before Eurovision Yevrobachennia 2014Natsionalnyi vidbir The Ukrainian national final took place on 21 December 2013 at the NTU Studios in Kyiv. The show was hosted by Timur Myroshnychenko and Tetiana Terekhova and broadcast on Pershyi Natsionalnyi as well as online via NTU's official website 1tv.com.ua and the official Eurovision Song Contest website eurovision.tv.
Format The selection of the competing entries for the national final and ultimately the Ukrainian Eurovision entry took place over two stages. In the first stage, artists and songwriters had the opportunity to apply for the competition by attending a scheduled audition. Twenty acts were selected and announced on 8 December 2013. The second stage was the televised final, which took place on 21 December 2013 and featured the twenty acts vying to represent Ukraine in Copenhagen. The winner was selected via the 50/50 combination of votes from a public televote and an expert jury. Both the public televote and the expert jury assigned scores ranging from 1 (lowest) to 12 (highest) and the entry that had the highest number of points following the combination of these scores was declared the winner. Viewers participating in the public televote had the opportunity to submit a single vote per phone number for each of the participating entries via SMS. In the event of a tie, the tie was decided in favour of the entry that received the highest score from the jury.
Competing entries Artists and composers had the opportunity to submit their entries between 23 October 2013 and 6 December 2013. Auditions were held on 7 December 2013 at the Novopecherski Lypky in Kyiv where a four-member selection panel consisting of Vlad Baginsky (music producer of NTU), Mikhail Nekrasov (composer and producer), Yevgeniy Feshak (general producer of Radio Lux.FM) and Volodymyr Kozlov (programme director of RU.Music) reviewed the 56 received submissions and shortlisted twenty entries to compete in the national final. On 8 December 2013, the twenty selected competing acts were announced along with the running order, which was decided during a draw that took place following the auditions on 7 December. Among the competing artists was Viktoria Petryk who represented Ukraine in the Junior Eurovision Song Contest 2008. Artist SongSongwriter(s) Anatolii Shparev "Waiting for You"Andrii Osadchuk Anna Khodorovska "Yesli yest' lyubov'" Ruslan Kvinta, Vitalii Kurovskyi Anna-Maria "5 Stars Hotel"Eduard Pristupa, Sergey Ozeryanskiy Denys Liubimov "Love"Denys Liubimov Yevhen Litvinkovich "Strelyanaya ptitsa" Yevhen Litvinkovich Illaria "I'm Alive"Katerina Prishchepa Lissa Wassabi "No Fear"Yelyzaveta Zhykhareva Marietta "It's My Life"Dmitriy Sidorov, Natali Dali Mariya Yaremchuk "Tick-Tock"Mariya Yaremchuk Natalia Valevska "Love Makes You Beautiful"Ylva Persson, Linda Persson neAngely "Courageous"Alexander Bard, Andreas Öhrn, Christian Wahlberg, Per Ljungqvist, Henrik Wikström Roman Polonskyi "Wanted Dead or Alive"Roman Polonsky, Sergey Dubenko Shanis "Moya dusha" Elaydzha Stas Shurins "Why"Stas Shurins Tania BerQ "Believe Me"Borys Tarshys Tetiana Shyrko "Let Go"Yuliya Slobodyan, Evheniy Matyushenko Uli Rud "Tsvetok" Misha Klimenko, Kseniya Shevchenko Viktor Romanchenko "Na krayu propasti" Volodymyr Dushevnyi, Viktor Romanchenko Viktoria Petryk "Love Is Lord"Giga Kukhianidze, Ben Kadagidze Volodymyr Tkachenko "Buty tam, de ty" Volodymyr Tkachenko, Iryna Pyrih
Final The final took place on 21 December 2013. Twenty entries competed and the winner, "Tick-Tock" performed by Mariya Yaremchuk, was selected through the combination of votes from a public televote and an expert jury. Ties were decided in favour of the entries that received higher scores from the jury.Maria Yaremchuk to represent Ukraine at Eurovision Song Contest 2014, Interfax-Ukraine (21 December 2013) The jury panel consisted of Oleksandr Panteleymonov (general director of NTU), Vlad Baginsky (music producer of NTU), Yuriy Rybchynsky (poet), Yan Tabachnyk (composer) and Mikhail Nekrasov (composer and producer). 10,210 votes were registered by the televote during the show. In addition to the performances of the competing entries, 2011 Ukrainian Eurovision entrant Mika Newton, 2013 Ukrainian Eurovision entrant Zlata Ognevich, 2013 Ukrainian Junior Eurovision entrant Sofia Tarasova, Kamaliya, Masha Sobko, Matias and Natalia Buchynska performed as guests.
+ Final – 21 December 2013 Artist Song Jury Televote Total Place Votes Points 1 Anna-Maria "5 Stars Hotel" 3 136 1 4 16 2 Roman Polonskyi "Wanted Dead or Alive" 5 73 1 6 12 3 Uli Rud "Tsvetok" 1 76 1 2 20 4 Marietta "It's My Life" 4 107 1 5 14 5 Stas Shurins "Why" 5 194 4 9 10 6 Anatolii Shparev "Waiting for You" 7 124 1 8 11 7 Natalia Valevska "Love Makes You Beautiful" 5 1,050 9 14 7 8 Lissa Wassabi "No Fear" 1 170 2 3 19 9 Volodymyr Tkachenko "Buty tam, de ty" 11 368 5 16 4 10 Shanis "Moya dusha" 9 47 1 10 9 11 Viktoria Petryk "Love Is Lord" 10 476 7 17 2 12 Yevhen Litvinkovich "Strelyanaya ptitsa" 2 1,090 10 12 8 13 neAngely "Courageous" 6 800 8 14 6 14 Illaria "I'm Alive" 8 420 6 14 5 15 Tetiana Shyrko "Let Go" 3 171 3 6 13 16 Tania BerQ "Believe Me" 3 41 1 4 16 17 Mariya Yaremchuk "Tick-Tock" 12 3,478 12 24 1 18 Viktor Romanchenko "Na krayu propasti" 5 1,170 11 16 3 19 Anna Khodorovska "Yesli yest' lyubov'" 2 99 1 3 18 20 Denys Liubimov "Love" 4 120 1 5 14
Controversy Following Mariya Yaremchuk's victory at the Ukrainian national final, several participants launched a protest against the final results, alleging that the phone lines for their entries were blocked while the phone line for Yaremchuk remained open. Olena Mozhova, the producer of Volodymyr Tkachenko, challenged the legitimacy of the results and planned to take legal action; similar complaints were also launched by Viktoria Petryk and the duo neAngely regarding the results of the public vote.
Preparation The official music video of "Tick-Tock", directed by Serhiy Knyazev and produced by Alternatyva Company, was released on 17 March. A revamped version of the song, featuring new arrangement and lyrics written by Mariya Yaremchuk in cooperation with Sandra Bjurman, was also featured in the music video.
Promotion Mariya Yaremchuk made several appearances across Europe to specifically promote "Tick-Tock" as the Ukrainian Eurovision entry. On 7 February, Yaremchuk performed an alternate version of "Tick-Tock" during the semi-final of the Maltese Eurovision national final. On 5 April, Yaremchuk performed during the Eurovision in Concert event which was held at the Melkweg venue in Amsterdam, Netherlands and hosted by Cornald Maas and Sandra Reemer. On 13 April, Yaremchuk performed during the London Eurovision Party, which was held at the Café de Paris venue in London, United Kingdom and hosted by Nicki French and Paddy O'Connell. On 25 and 26 April, Mariya Yaremchuk took part in promotional activities in Greece which included television and radio appearances, as well as performing during an event organised by OGAE Greece and held at the Shamone Club in Athens.
At Eurovision According to Eurovision rules, all nations with the exceptions of the host country and the "Big Five" (France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom) are required to qualify from one of two semi-finals in order to compete for the final; the top ten countries from each semi-final progress to the final. The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) split up the competing countries into six different pots based on voting patterns from previous contests, with countries with favourable voting histories put into the same pot. On 20 January 2014, a special allocation draw was held which placed each country into one of the two semi-finals, as well as which half of the show they would perform in. Ukraine was placed into the first semi-final, to be held on 6 May 2014, and was scheduled to perform in the second half of the show.
Once all the competing songs for the 2014 contest had been released, the running order for the semi-finals was decided by the shows' producers rather than through another draw, so that similar songs were not placed next to each other. Ukraine was set to perform in position 9, following the entry from Azerbaijan and before the entry from Belgium.
In Ukraine, both the semi-finals and the final were broadcast on Pershyi Natsionalnyi with commentary by Timur Miroshnychenko and Tetiana Terekhova. The three shows were also broadcast via radio on UR-2 with commentary by Olena Zelinchenko. The Ukrainian spokesperson, who announced the Ukrainian votes during the final, was 2013 Ukrainian representative Zlata Ognevich.
Semi-final Mariya Yaremchuk took part in technical rehearsals on 29 April and 2 May, followed by dress rehearsals on 5 and 6 May. This included the jury show on 5 May where the professional juries of each country watched and voted on the competing entries.