Welcome back to a regular ESC Insight Newsletter back home after we all scurried across to Sofia for Junior Eurovision. Read the full Newsletter here and don’t forget to subscribe via this link.
The Newsletter this week has lots of news from Australia to Germany and a barrage of headlines from Sweden, most importantly of course the full details on tickets that go on sale Thursday 26th November. Our regular column Robertson’s Reflection this week looks back on the Junior Eurovision with one proposal to make the competition better. Junior Eurovision needs a dedicated EBU staff member responsible for ensuring artist well-being.
Both Jon Jacob and John Lucas this week for the ESC Insight team picked out one performer who didn’t seem to be as engaged with the process as others were. We were more than a little bit concerned. With my professional hat on being responsible for the social and emotional well-being of students aged between 11 and 12 in a bilingual, international profile school, what I witnessed in the Press Conference and on stage was something that I couldn’t ignore.
I brought up what I saw with staff at the EBU, and I’m sure nobody will be offended by saying that they didn’t really know what to do. I believe we left it with a plan that they would drop our Executive Supervisor a quiet word in the evening, but as important as artist welfare is I wouldn’t be surprised if the day before the big show there would just be a little too much to do. There was an obvious gap in knowledge on the side of the EBU and no dedicated person in which to go to for help.
Make sure to read more of Ben’s arguments and thoughts in full by clicking on this link to read the full Newsletter.