AstroVision Retro Song Festival 1

"Timeless Memories"

## Dates

Semi Finals : July, 18 & 19 2023

Grand Final : July, 28 2023

## Host

Venue : Movistar Arena, Bogotá, Colombia

Hosts : Karol G, Alejandra Buitrago & Verónica Orozco

Broadcaster : Caracol Televisión

## Participants

Number of entries : 42

Debuting countries : Aland Islands , Armenia , Austria , Belgium , Brazil , Canada , Cayman Islands , China , Colombia , Denmark , Germany , Gibraltar , Guam , Guernsey , Hungary , Ireland , Isle Of Man , Italy , Jamaica , Japan , Jersey , Liechtenstein , Malta , Mexico , Monaco , Morocco , New Zealand , Norway , Portugal , Russia , San Marino , Slovakia , Somalia , South Africa , Spain , Sweden , Syria , Togo , U.S. Virgin Islands , United Kingdom , United States

Returning countries : None

Non-returning countries : None

## Winner

Winner : **Norway** a-ha - *"Take On Me"*

Points : 227

The **AstroVision Retro Song Festival #1**, often shortened **AVRSF #1**, is the first edition of the Worldwide retro spin-off of the AstroVision Song Festival, a European-based fan contest.

This edition was hosted in the Movistar Arena located in Bogotá, Colombia by the Colombian national broadcaster Caracol Televisión.

## Host & Organization

- **COLOMBIA**  : The host of this edition has been decided internally. As the AstroVision Retro Song Festival directly inherits from the AstroVision Song Contest RETRO Special Edition, a special edition of the former AstroVision Song Contest, the AVBU decided that the winner of this edition would be selected as the host for the AVRSF #1. Therefore, as they won that edition thanks to Shakira and her song *Whenever, Wherever*, **Colombia**  was granted the hosting ticket for this edition on July, 6th 2023.

After their selection as the host for the edition, the national broadcaster Caracol Televisión began their internal search for their venue. Two venues were retained in a broad field of Colombian music venues : the Coliseo El Pueblo located in Cali ; and the Movistar Arena, located in Bogotá. On July, 7th 2023, it was revealed that the Movisar Arena would be welcoming this edition.

On the same day, the broadcaster revealed both the theme art and the stage design for this edition. The theme represents a flower in neon, with its petals surrounding the edition's slogan, on a sytnhwave background. This theme art represents Colombia's climate, as well as proposing a neo-retro overall design. The slogan of this edition is "Timeless Memories" ("Souvenirs Intemporels" in French), which refers to this edition's ambition to bring back classics of the musical industry on the foreground again, and invites the audience to celebrate together the music of the past and songs which made our childhood. The stage design for AVRSF #1 is composed of a very large quadilateral background screen surrounded by neons, which is along a structure made out of 38 neon bars which form a 90° angle on the right of the screen. This structure is along with two sets of projectors which form triangular holes, a massive set of projectors on the background walls, a rectangular-shaped podium made out of screens and surrounded by neon bars, and six neon bars suspended on the podium on the left side of it. The stage design is finished off with five large neon bars which go through the audience. The Colombian broadcaster Caracol Televisión justifies this stage design as *"a proof of Colombia's ability to provide modern entertainment shows in the philosophy of the channel's programmation, and to allow artist to express themselves with the best tools to work with technically, visually, and musically speaking"*.

    Moreover, it was also officialized that the hosts for this edition would be singer Karol G, model, television presenter and actress Alejandra Buitrago & actor and singer Verónica Orozco.

## Contest

### Returning Artists

Five artists were confirmed to take part again to an AstroVision contest.

### Semifinals

The AVBU announced that 42 countries would participate in the first edition of the AstroVision Retro Song Festival. On July, 17 2023, the AVBU revealed the running orders for the two semifinals of the AVRSF #1. They have been decided through three randomizations : 6 pots, 4 halves and 2 official running orders. The semifinals took place respectively for SF1 and SF2 on July, 18 and July, 19 2023.

Results for both semifinals were revealed on July, 25th 2023. 10 countries qualified from semifinal 1 and 10 from semifinal 2. Qualifiers were announced in a random order :

- Italy , Guernsey , Armenia , Hungary , United States , Gibraltar , Russia , Guam , Jamaica  & Japan  for Semifinal 1,

- Cayman Islands , Jersey , U.S. Virgin Islands , Ireland , Aland Islands , South Africa , United Kingdom , Malta , Norway  & San Marino  for Semifinal 2.

#### Semi Final 1

 Qualified for the Grand Final

Not qualified for the Grand Final

 Countries which are tied in points

 Last place in the Semifinal

#### Semi Final 2

 Qualified for the Grand Final

Not qualified for the Grand Final

 Countries which are tied in points

 Last place in the Semifinal

### Grand Final

On July, 26 2023, the AVBU revealed the running order for the Grand Final of the AVRSF #1. It has been decided through two randomizations : two halves with a perfect balance of 5 qualfiers from SF1, 5 qualifiers from SF2 and 3 big 6 countries each & 1 official running order.

The voting scores were revealed in two times : first, the points from the Jury Voting were revealed, followed by the Televoting scores afterwards.

After the two sets of points, it was announced that **Norway**  was the winner of the first edition of the AstroVision Retro Song Festival, with a global score of 227 points, which became the record of points in AVSF history for the Grand Final. **San Marino**  finished in second place with 224 points. The **United States**  finished in third place with 181 points, followed by **Malta** , **Hungary**  and **Japan**  to complete the top 6, which will be prequalified for the upcoming AVRSF #2 Grand Final.

 Country which finished in first place

 Country which finished in second place

 Country which finished in third place

 Country which is prequalified for the next edition

 Countries which are tied in points

 Country which finished in last place