Dear EBU, Dear Reference Group

We send our wishes of good health to you in these hard times.

We are writing collectively, to express our sadness and disappointment, about your decision to not allow songs to be carried forward to 2021’s Eurovision Song Contest.

We, of course, understand the reasons for Eurovision not taking place in May 2020, and agree that this is the right decision. We also agree that it is right that you have allowed delegations to decide whether or not they take the same artist forward to 2021, as this is the honourable thing to do.

However, that leaves, Songwriters, Song Producers, Publishers and those that started the creative process, all putting in so much work and creativity, as the only ones who are not included and allowed to compete in 2021. We as a group are not allowed to enjoy the fact that we won national finals and have been selected, or that we won an internal competition. Chances are lost for us, yet everyone else has been considered and allowed to get a second chance.

It also means, that all of these creative people, are unpaid for their hard work, as everything to this point is done speculatively, a songwriters reward comes through seeing their work performed and earning royalties from that. This highlights to us as a group, that we are at the bottom of the pile, unthought of when these decisions take place.

We just have to look closely at the name of the contest, “The Eurovision SONG Contest”, to understand that the song is central to the competition, and without songwriters, producers and publishers, their would be no songs.

So many of us are disheartened by this decision, as we have input so much already, but we have no protection over our work.

Let’s also remind ourselves, that the songs are released because we agreed to abide by delivering our works to you by the deadline of March 9th, so they can be included on the Eurovision YouTube Channel.

The same rules you are claiming now, that make them invalid for next year’s ESC. This is not fair at all! We would have never released this songs otherwise and would have use it differently!

We do understand that your decision has come from a hasty place in a very difficult time.

However, the simple solution we feel, is for the 1st September rule, to be changed, for this one year only, and for delegations to be allowed to choose whether they want to use the same songs or not, in the same way you have allowed them to choose the same artist.

We ask you to consider this once more and consider giving us the same rights as you have given others.

Kind regards

Songwriters, Producers, Publishers