Eurovision Song Festival 6

The Eurovision Song Festival 6 will be the 6th edition of the Eurovision Song Festival. It will take place in the O2 Arena in London, United Kingdom. This will be the first time the contest will take place in the United Kingdom. The contest is expected to consist of two semi-finals on 8 December and the final on 8 December 2017.

On the 21st of November, the EBO confirmed that a total of 44 countries will be present in the sixth edition of the Eurovision Song Festival.

## Location

### **Bidding phase**

On 10 September 2017, the EBO confirmed that four cities were in the race to host the sixth edition of the Eurovision Song Festival. The host city will be announced on the 21st of November 2017. The head of the contest, Adéla Bronislava, announced that the host city announcement will take place on 22:30 CET.

All cities were allowed to submit a venue for hosting the contest. The cities had to announce the venue and the capacity for the show. In the end, four cities were submitted to host the contest. The following cities are in the race to host the contest:
  †   Host venue
  ‡   Shortlisted

### **Venue**

The O2 Arena (temporarily the sponsor neutral "North Greenwich Arena", during the 2012 Summer Olympics and 2012 Summer Paralympics), is a multi purpose indoor arena located in the centre of The O2 entertainment complex on the Greenwich Peninsula in south east London.

The arena was built under the former Millennium Dome, a large dome shaped building built to house an exhibition celebrating the turn of the third millennium; as the dome shaped structure still stands over the arena, The Dome remains a name in common usage for the venue. The arena, as well as the total O2 complex, is named after its primary sponsor, the telecommunications company O2.

The O2 Arena has the second highest seating capacity of any indoor venue in the United Kingdom, behind the Manchester Arena, but took the crown of the world's busiest music arena from New York City's Madison Square Garden in 2008. The closest underground station to the venue is the North Greenwich station on the Jubilee line.

#### History

Following the closure of the Millennium Experience at the end of 2000, the Millennium Dome was leased to Meridian Delta Ltd. in December 2001, for redevelopment as an entertainment complex. This included plans for an indoor arena.

Construction of the arena started in 2003, and finished in 2007. After the interior of the dome had been largely cleared and before building work inside began, in December 2004, the dome was used as the main venue for the annual Crisis Open Christmas organised by the London based homelessness charity Crisis.

Owing to the impossibility of using cranes inside the dome structure, the arena's roof was constructed on the ground within the dome and then lifted. The arena building's structure was then built around the roof. The arena building, which houses the arena and the arena concourse, is independent from all other buildings in the O2 and houses all the arena's facilities. The arena building itself takes up 40% of the total dome structure.

The seating arrangement throughout the whole arena can be modified, similar to the Manchester Arena. The ground surface can also be changed between ice rink, basketball court, exhibition space, conference venue, private hire venue and concert venue.

The arena was built to reduce echoing, a common problem among London music venues.

## Format

On the 4th of October, the EBO confirmed that 2 Semi-Finals and the final were scheduled to take place in December. There is a jury and a televote. They both decide 50% of the score. There was also a big 6 pre-qualified to the final. Those countries were the host United Kingdom, Hungary, Moldova, Albania, Armenia and Romania.

## Participating countries

Participating countries had until 15 November 2017 to submit their applications for participation in the contest. The EBO announced on 21 November that 44 countries would participate in the contest.

Belgium and Malta returned, while France and Germany decided to withdraw after a string of poor results.

## Results

### **Semi-final 1**

Nineteen countries participated in the first semi-final. The highlighted countries qualified for the final.

### **Semi-final 2**

Nineteen countries participated in the first semi-final. The highlighted countries qualified for the final.