REGULATION for the EUROVISION SONG CONTEST NATIONAL SELECTION 2022

EUROVISION 2022

I. GENERAL PROVISIONS

1.1. The Romanian Television Company (SRTV), in its capacity of Organizer, as conferred by the European Broadcasting Union (E.B.U.), yearly organizes the National Selection for Eurovision, in the form of a contest.

1.2. In 2022, the European final of Eurovision Song Contest will take place in Torino, Italy, on 10^th, 12^th and 14^th of May, 2022.

1.3 The National Selection for Eurovision 2022 includes several phases, namely an registration period, a preselection, a semi-final and a final where the winning song will be announced and designated to represent Romania at Torino – Italy.

II. REGISTER PERIOD

2.1. During the registration period 26^th of November– 19^th of December 2021 (the date of the receipt of materials by email), the Romanian or foreign citizens that could represent Romania at Eurovision 2022 are invited to register, submitting the following items:

a) the song/audio recording, in WAV format, by transfer.ro or wetransfer.com to eurovision.romania@tvr.ro, containing the final version of the song and an instrumental version, without the singer's voice, but with backing vocals.

a.1 Complete information about the participating song:

-   Title

-   Name(s) of the singer/band, Romanian or foreign citizens

-   Name(s) of the composer(s)

-   Name(s) of the author(s) of the lyrics

-    Name of the producer (publisher), if any

a.2 The Organizer and the jury members shall maintain the confidentiality of:

- Name(s) of the composer(s)

- Name(s) of the author(s) of the lyrics

- Name of the producer (publisher), if any.

b) a phone video recording of the performance of the song, in a capella style and also a selfie;

c) an affidavit in the form specified in Annex 1 to this Regulation, whereby the author retains responsibility for stating that the song enlisted for the contest was not, either in whole or in part, made available to the public under the conditions set forth in Article 2.7 of this Regulation, by means of any audio or video media, radio or television channel, whether public or private, national or local, or internet or any public performance (including concerts) in Romania or abroad, whether or not it was officially recorded on any magnetic or digital medium or in any other form of public communication, and that the song was not commercially realesed  and/or publicly performed (either in whole or in part) before the 1st of September 2021, that it is an original creation which shall not affect the rights held by any third parties;

d) the written agreement between the author and the performer(s) regarding the participation in the National Selection for Eurovision 2022, the model of which is in the form presented as Annex 2 to this Regulation;

e) the written authorization signed by the holders of copyrights and related rights - author/artist/producer of the work/ owner of the (audio) recording, as per the model presented as Annex 3 to this Regulation, regarding the assignment of the material copyrights and related rights over the work, performance and recording (master), as well as the obligations regarding the promotion of the contest.

f) the text of the song in the language in which it is performed and an ad literam translation of the song into Romanian, if the text is in a foreign language;

g) a copy of the identity document of the author/authors, artists and of the producer’s representative (if applicable);

h) the telephone number and e-mail address;

i) the proof of payment of the register fee (a copy of the payment order). The register fee is 200 lei for each submitted song and will be transferred into account RO69RNCB0072000506070001 opened with BCR District 1. This fee will be used for the organization of the National Selection.

a) 2.2. The submission of the items detailed above is done by sending an e-mail to the address: eurovision.romania@tvr.ro.

2.3. The text of the song must not have an obscene or political character or contain any advertising messages.

2.4. In this phase only the songs delivered through file transfer by e-mail to eurovision.romania@tvr.ro, in WAV format will be admitted. The procedure will only be deemed to be completed after the sender has received a confirmation from the same e-mail address.

2.5. The songs, as well as their performances, shall not exceed 3 minutes, otherwise they will be disqualified. No more than 6 performers will be admitted on stage. The performer should be at least 16 years of age on the date of the international final, at the latest.

2.6. All the materials from the registration procedure, including the registration fee, will be retained and cannot be returned, whether they are admitted or not for participation in the subsequent phases of the contest.

2.7. All the contestants in the contest shall assume the mandatory and eliminatory obligation to participate with a song (music and/or text) which is original and does not affect any rights held by any third parties, which was not edited on any audio or video medium or broadcasted on any radio or television channel or on the internet or made available to the public in any way, either in whole or in part, until the 1^st of September 2021.

2.8 If, in any phase of the contest, a third party submits evidence that a song breaches the mandatory and eliminatory obligation mentioned above, the respective song will be disqualified by the organizers. A committee appointed by SRTv in its capacity of Organizer will analyze such evidence (including allegations of plagiarism). The final decision will solely lie with SRTv. The liability for any allegation of plagiarism will solely rest with the Author of the song concerned.

2.9. On 20.12.2021, the centralization of the registrations and the verification of the submitted documents will be carried out by a Reception Commission at the SRTV headquarters. This will certify the existence / non-existence of the documents requested by the Organizer, according to the Contest Rules. The results of the registration will be recorded in a report, assumed by the members of the commission.

2.10. In case the reception commission finds that the submitted documentation, except the audio recording, is incomplete, the concerned contestant will be granted a maximum of 24 hours to submit/complete the relevant documents. Such request may be made by telephone (SMS) and/or e-mail.

2.11. Failure to submit/send the documents within the deadline specified above, according to the request of the reception commission, will result in the disqualification of the contestant.

III. PRESELECTION

3.1. The preselection phase will be carried out on 21^st, and 22^nd of December 2021, at SRTv premises. Each song entered in the contest will be heard by a specialized jury, consisting of 5 members.

3.2. The members of the Jury are appointed by the Organizer (SRTv). They will take responsibility for the conditions of the contest and must meet the following conditions:

a) they should have no interest whatsoever in connection with the song, the authors or the performer, which could affect their impartiality while casting their votes;

b) they should fill in a standard form confirming that they will comply with the voting instructions set out in this Regulation, as well as a signed statement whereby they undertake to vote in an independent manner.

3.3 Each member of the jury will receive an evaluation sheet containing the titles of all songs and the names of the interpreters, the Organizer maintaining the confidentiality of the authors. The jury members will only find the identity of the authors (composer and lyricist) of the songs enlisted for the contest after the completion of the judging process.

3.4. In the pre-selection phase, for the first stage of the semifinal, the songs will be appreciated on the basis of the rating from 1 to 10 and the jury will select 45 songs against the following criteria:

a)  the musical form of the song, assessing the development of the melodic theme, its harmonization, as well as the rhythmic and melodic elements which confer an appropriate musical structure to the song;

b)  the way in which the orchestration of the songs is done from the point of view of their writing;

c)   the inventive and original character of the musical themes;

d)   the stylistic diversity of the competing songs;

e)   the quality of the sound and vocal performance.

3.5. The performer can only perform one song entered in the contest, which cannot be replaced during the contest. One composer can have several songs enlisted for the contest, if they are sung by different performers.

3.6. In case of a tie-vote, the song with the most numerous ratings of 10 will win. If a tie-vote is found again, the most numerous ratings of 8 will be taken into consideration, and so on and so forth until a differentiation can be made.

3.7. The jury members must sign both their own evaluation sheet and the minute drafted after the exact establishment, in the preselection phase, of those 45 songs which will participate in the semi-finals.

3.8. The selected songs will be announced on SRTV sites and the results will also be sent for publication in the central press, no later than September 23, 2021.

3.9. If, for objective reasons, a composer withdraws his/her song from the contest, this can only be made by an official application signed, scanned and filed with the contest secretariat and sent by e-mail to: eurovision.romania@tvr.ro within 24 hours since the time when the winners were announced. Unless the application for withdrawing the song is communicated to SRTv within the above mentioned term of 24 hours, the provisions of Article 6 of Annex 2 will apply.

3.10. Any appeal will be submitted within 24 hours from the publishing of the results of the preselection by email to eurovision.romania@tvr.ro. Appeals will be solved by an Appeal Committee, which will include 3 members of which one will be the Jury Chairman. They will prepare and communicate a written answer by e-mail or by post to the address indicated by the appellant. The term for solving each appeal is 2 working days from the expiration of the term for submitting the appeals.

3.11. The authors and the performers of the selected songs undertake to conclude an agreement with SRTv whereby, among others, they shall detail the editorial, artistic, organizational obligations, as well as those related to public communication and conduct in connection with the participation in the international Eurovision Song Contest 2022.

IV. SEMIFINAL:

4.1. The semifinal of the National Selection takes place between February 5-12, 2022 and has two stages:

a) the first stage consists in organizing a judging and voting session between the 5^th and 12^th of February 2022;

b) the second stage consists in the organization of a television show broadcast live from SRTV studios on the 12^th of February 2022.

A. In the first stage of the semifinal of the Eurovision National Selection 2022, respectively in the period 5-10 February 2022, all the 45 songs resulting from the pre-selection stage will participate.

4.2. Following the broadcasting of the 45 songs on SRTV channels, according to the approved program schedule and their online posting (on SRTV's YouTube channel), the participating songs will be judged by the Specialized Jury and voted online by the public.

4.3. The specialized jury will grant ratings from 1 to 12, as follows: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 12. Each rating will only be granted once to each song. The judging process will end with a ranking where the first 15 songs will qualify for the 2^nd stage of the semifinal.

4.4. In case of a tie-vote, the winning song will be the one which has obtained the most 12 ratings from the jury. If, however, equality between the graded songs is maintained, the most numerous 10 ratings, shall be taken into consideration, respectively the most 8 ratings and so on and so forth.

4.5. Each jury member will sign the evaluation sheet and the jury minutes and will deliver them to the secretariat of the jury until the 9^th of February, 8 pm.

4.6. Also at this stage, the online public votes for the participating songs on the Eurovision Romania Facebook account, between February 9, 8 pm - February 10, 8 pm.

4.7. The organizer posts online the table with all the participating songs, in alphabetical order. Each account user has the right to vote one track, once.

4.8. The online public vote ends on February 10 at 8 pm, resulting in a ranking from which the first 5 songs qualify for the second semifinal.

4.9. In the situation where among the qualified pieces by public vote there are qualified songs following the judging carried out according to point 4.3. and 4.4., the ranking changes until the songs don’t match / overlap.

B. In the second stage of the Semifinal of the National Selection for Eurovision 2022, 20 songs will participate.

4.10. On the 12^th of February 2022, a television show will be organized in which the contestants will perform live the songs qualified for this stage, with negative, which may contain vocal backing and computerized vocal effects, except the melodic line (the dubbing of the melodic line is done by a live backing vocal), and computer effects cannot derive from the main voice processing.

4.11. After the live performance, the specialized jury from the studio will grant ratings from 1 to 12, as follows: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 12. Each rating will only be granted once to each song. The judging process will end with a ranking where the first 10 songs will qualify for the final.

4.12. In case of a tie-vote, the winning song will be the one which has obtained the most 12 ratings from the jury. If, however, equality between the graded songs is maintained, the most numerous 10 ratings, shall be taken into consideration, respectively the most 8 ratings and so on and so forth.

4.13. Each jury member, including the Chairman, will sign the evaluation sheet and the jury minutes and will deliver them to the secretariat of the jury at the end of the television show.

V. FINAL:

5.1. The final stage of the Eurovision National Selection 2022 will take place on the 5^th of March 2022 and will consist of the organization of a television show in which the contestants will perform live the songs selected for this phase; this show will be broadcasted live from the SRTV premises or from other location, according to the Organizer’s decision.

5.2. Each song will be allocated a number which will be displayed during the performance of the song, in an equal manner for all the contestants.

5.3. The designation of the winning song is made following the judging process and the viewers' vote (by sms), as follows:

5.3.1. The judging process is carried out according to the procedure provided in points 4.11 - 4.13. of this Regulation.

5.3.2. The viewers' vote consists of sending an SMS with a text message containing the contest number of the favorite song, from the "START VOTE" moment until the "STOP VOTE" moment. Viewers will be able to vote on the same phone number for one or more songs, but only once for each song. Each song is assigned a number of points, as follows: the number of text messages received by that song divided by the largest number of text messages received by a song multiplied by 12 points. As a result, the whole and two decimals are kept. The final result is added to the number of points obtained for the same song from the jury.

The organizer reserves the right to cancel the votes generated as a result of fraudulent operation of mobile networks.

5.3.3. The organizer makes a ranking of the songs by summing the points obtained from the members of the jury according to points 4.11 - 4.12 with the points obtained according to 5.3.2 from the public vote.

5.4. The winning song of the Eurovision National Selection 2022 will be the one that obtains the highest number of points, calculated according to point 5.3.3.

5.5. The announcement and display of the results will be done both within the show of the National Selection Final and online, on the Eurovision Romania Facebook account and on http://eurovision.tvr.ro.

5.6. To ensure the fairness of the judging process in the Eurovision National Selection 2022, SRTv will resort to the services of a notary public.

5.7. Any appeal will be submitted within 48 hours from the publishing of the results of the final by email to eurovision.romania@tvr.ro. Appeals will be solved by an Appeal Committee, which will include 3 members of which one will be the representative of the televoting company. The term for solving an appeal is 72 hours hours from the expiry date of the submission deadline for appeals.

VI. LIMITATIONS AND RESERVATIONS

6.1. During the participation in the Eurovision contest (the national phase and the international phase):

a) The artist's team shall be supported by SRTV team so as to put the show concept of his/her song on stage, in the best possible conditions. The artistic performance must be in accordance with the indications of the stage director from SRTv.

b) neither the performer, nor the composer may conclude any agreement with third parties regarding the rights assigned to SRTv.

6.2. During the international stage of the competition (the international semi-final and final), the artist's management shall comply with the priorities and conditions imposed by SRTv and the host country of the international ESC 2022 regarding the promotion and preparation of the artist’s participation and performance in the international phase, as the Representative of Romania.

6.3. The Organizer shall bear the travel and accommodation expenses for the artist who will participate in the international phase as the representative of Romania, within the limit of maximum 8 people.

VII. FINAL PROVISIONS

7.1. By entering the international contest, after the completion of the National Selection, the authors and the performers of the winning song are obliged to sign an agreement with SRTv whereby they shall detail the editorial, artistic, organizational obligations, as well as those related to public communication and conduct in connection with the participation in the international Eurovision Song Contest 2022 which is held on in Torino, Italy, on 10^th, 12^th and 14^th of May, 2022. Failure by the authors/artists or holders of rights over the participating song to sign an agreement for their participation in the national or international final will constitute a reason of disqualification of the song from the contest.

7.2. All the artists and other holders of rights undertake to authorize the use, reproduction, printing and publication of their names, images, voices, photographs and biographies in the context of promoting, broadcasting and/or of the commercial exploitation of the shows by all means and on any media channel, either from among the currently known channels, or from any subsequent ones, for an unlimited period of time. This also involves the use of the photographs and any other audio and video materials from press conferences, or recorded at rehearsals or backstage, for DVD compilations, for the websites of SRTv, Eurovision or their official partners, as well as of any other SRTv or Eurovision media product.

7.3. The artists have the obligation to take part in the press conferences organized by SRTv and EBU. The winning artist (artists) have the obligation to participate in the official press conference after the preselection, national and international final, in promotion shows made  by SRTv with priority, to mutually agree with the Organizer on their participation in any show broadcasted on any other media channel, and to authorize the use of any recording on any media channel (including the Internet) without any time or territory limitations.

7.4. Participation in the international phase of the contest requires the compliance with the provisions of the International Regulation EUROVISION SONG CONTEST 2022, including the conditions and safety measures regarding the prevention and control of the spread of SARS-COV-2 infections imposed by the host country of the International ESC 2022.

7.5. Failure to comply with the provisions 7.4. by the winner of the Eurovision 2022 National Selection is a reason to disqualify the song from the competition, in which case the Organizer has the right to declare the winner the next ranked according to point 5.3.3.

7.6. This Regulation, together with its 3 Annexes, the International Regulation EUROVISION SONG CONTEST 2022, as well as any other information about the contest will be posted on the website www.eurovision.tvr.ro, with a link to the official website of EUROVISION SONG CONTEST 2022 (www.eurovision.tv).

7.7. The Organizer reserves the right to make changes to this Regulation, in which case all the participants will be informed in due time.