Greece in the Eurovision Song Contest 2012


Greece participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2012 with the song "Aphrodisiac" written by Dimitri Stassos, Mikaela Stenström, and Dajana Lööf. The song was performed by Eleftheria Eleftheriou, who had previously attempted to represent Greece in the Eurovision Song Contest 2010.
The Greek entry for the 2012 contest in Baku, Azerbaijan was selected through the televised national final Ellinikós Telikós, organised by the country's public broadcasting service Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation. Due to the debt crisis facing the nation at the time, the record label of the entry was expected to take on the costs of recording and producing the candidate songs. Universal Music Greece was the only label to accept these terms and put forth four competing acts. Eleftheria Eleftheriou with "Aphrodisiac" won the final, which was held on 12 March 2012 at the River West shopping mall in Athens. The winning act was selected using a combination of jury and televoting. Following the national final, Eleftheriou embarked on a promotional campaign with the majority of it taking place online.
Greece was drawn to compete third in the first semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest, which took place on 22 May 2012. It finished in 4th place in the first semi-final with 116 points and qualified to participate in the Grand Final at the Baku Crystal Hall on 26 May 2012. At the semi-final qualifiers news conference, a running order draw took place for the ten qualifiers to determine were each country would perform during the Grand Final. Eleftheriou randomly selected the 16th position and performed after Denmark and before Sweden. Greece received 64 points at the Final from a combined jury and televote, finishing in 17th place.

Background

Prior to the 2012 contest, Greece had participated in the Eurovision Song Contest thirty-two times since its first entry in 1974, winning it in 2005 with the song "My Number One" performed by Helena Paparizou, and having placed third three times: in 2001 with the song "Die for You" performed by the duo Antique; in 2004 with "Shake It" performed by Sakis Rouvas; and in 2008 with "Secret Combination" performed by Kalomoira. Following the introduction of semi-finals for the 2004 contest, Greece has had a top ten placing each year. Its least successful result was in 1998 when it placed twentieth with the song "Mia Krifi Evesthisia" by Thalassa, receiving only twelve points in total, all from Cyprus.
The Greek national broadcaster, Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation, broadcasts the event within Greece and organises the selection process for the nation's entry. It has used various methods to select the entry in the past, such as internal selections and televised national finals to choose the performer, song,or both. In late November 2011, ERT's deputy public relations spokesperson Areti Kalesaki confirmed the country's participation in the 2012 contest citing to the contest's popularity. She also stated that their budget for the event would be lowered significantly compared to previous years.

Before Eurovision

''Ellinikós Telikós 2012''

ERT announced their selection plans on 30 January 2012, with the broadcaster further reaffirming that they would be participating in the contest at the most minimal possible cost due to the Greek government-debt crisis affecting the country. To achieve this, the broadcaster took a different approach compared to previous years, seeking to share a majority of the costs of participation with a major record label. Among the costs ERT sought for the label to cover were the costs of recording and production of the candidate songs, promotions including the production of the winner's promotional CD, wages for creative and artistic professionals, as well as covering the trip and accommodations in Baku. The only label to accept the terms was Universal Music Greece, leading to an agreement between the broadcaster and the label to organize the selection process.
As in past years, the winner was determined by a combination of the votes from a five-member jury and televoting. The members of the jury were Marina Lahana, Andreas Pilarinos, Foteini Giannolatou and radio producers Mihalis Tsaousopoulos and Tasos Trifonos. All proceeds from the televoting went to the charitable organizations "Kivotos Tou Kosmou", "Paidika Horia SOS", and "To Hamogelo Tou Paidiou".

Competing entries

On 23 February 2012, ERT announced that four acts would compete in a national final to be held on 12 March 2012. A draw to determine the running order was held on 4 March 2012 at a media event hosted by ERT and Universal Music Greece. The candidate songs were released on 28 February 2012 through ERT's official Eurovision website, Facebook and Twitter pages, though the names of the artists and songwriters were concealed in order to place emphasis predominantly on the songs. Two days later on 1 March 2012, the songs started playing on Hellenic Radio radio stations. On 4 March 2012, ERT and Universal Music Greece held a reception, inviting all mass media to meet the acts of the Greek national final. On 5 March 2012 all details were made known, and preview videos of the songs began airing on television. The four participating songs were "Baby I'm Yours" by Dora, "Killer Bee" by Cassiopeia, "No Parking" by Velvet Fire", and "Aphrodisiac" by Eleftheria Eleftheriou. Universal Music Greece released all four songs as digital downloads on the same date.
Dora's "Baby I'm Yours" was written by the duo Hush Hush, which consisted of Franc, and Ilias Pantazopoulos, with lyrics by Nektarios Tyrakis. Tyrakis is best known for writing lyrics for Greece's 2004 entry "Shake It", as well as Belarus's 2005 entry "Love Me Tonight". Dora had previously tried to represent Greece in the Junior Eurovision Song Contest 2006 at age fourteen, but placed fourth in the national final. The band Cassiopeia's song "Killer Bee" was composed by Christos Dantis with lyrics by Leonidas Chatzaras. Dantis was best known for writing Greece's winning entry "My Number One" in 2005, as well as his participation in the 2007 Greek national final. Cassiopeia was formed shortly before the national final, and consisted of three women named Elena, Naya, and Maria. The third entry Velvet Fire's song "No Parking" was written by George Samuelson and Leonidas Chantzaras. Velvet Fire was formed in late 2011, and consisted of George Alex and May Sokolai. The fourth and final competing entry, Eleftheria Eleftheriou's song "Aphrodisiac", was written by Dimitri Stassos, Mikaela Stenström, and Dajana Lööf. Stassos was best known for writing Spain's 2009 Eurovision entry "La noche es para mí", while Eleftheriou emerged as a participant from the second season of Greek talent show The X Factor. She had also tried to represent Greece in the Eurovision Song Contest 2010, but a week before song presentations her song was leaked, thus disqualifying her from the national final.

Results

Ellinikós Telikós 2012 took place on 12 March 2012 at the River West Mall in Athens and was hosted by Maria Kozakou and Giorgos Frantzeskakis. The show was broadcast on ERT's ET1 and ERT World television stations, as well as on the official websites of ERT and the Eurovision Song Contest. Interval acts during the show included a number of the 2012 Eurovision entries from other countries, such as Ivi Adamou of Cyprus, Sofi Marinova of Bulgaria, and Anggun of France. Greece's 2011 Eurovision entrant Loukas Giorkas, as well as Universal Music Greece roster acts Giorgos Sabanis and Christos P also performed during the show.
An estimated 24,557 televotes were cast in the final, with 14,172 coming from SMS votes and 10,385 from phone-in votes. At the end of the show, "Aphrodisiac" performed by Eleftheria Eleftheriou was revealed as the winner, coming first in both the televoting and jury vote. The final lasted about two hours, receiving 10.8% share according to ABG Nielsen Hellas. During the broadcast, #Eurovisiongr became a worldwide trending topic on Twitter.

Reception

Reactions to the national final were mostly negative, with many media personalities and viewers criticizing the choice of venue, poor production, lack of vision, poor hosts, and use of playback vocals instead of live vocals. ERT had used playback performances in years where there was only one artist, such as 2005, 2006, and 2009. This was used as a means to ensure that all of the songs would be given an equal performance by the artist and they would not favor a certain composer or song; however, in this case, viewers felt it did not allow them to choose the artist who would give the best vocal performance on the actual night. Many also commented that Eleftheriou's song and performance was reminiscent of past entrants Elena Paparizou and Kalomira. Despite the many complaints, others applauded the broadcaster's efforts to take part in the contest with a limited budget, and its clever choice of using a shopping mall's natural setting as a backdrop as opposed to a dark studio as was the case the previous year. Former entrant Sakis Rouvas also commended the broadcaster for continuing on a tight budget and commented that the result of production should have been expected as it was "a sign of the times", referring to the Greek government-debt crisis.

Promotion

To promote the entry, Eleftheriou made several appearances across Europe, including Turkey, and the Netherlands, where she participating in Eurovision in Concert, in Amsterdam.

At Eurovision

During the Semi-Final Allocation draw which was held on 25 January 2012, it was announced Greece was scheduled to compete in the first half of the first semi-final on 22 May. On 20 March 2012 the Running Order draw was held, which determined the order of which the participants performed. Greece was set to perform 3rd in the first semi-final.
The choreography used during the event was different from its initial performance when the song was first presented at the selection procedure.
The song eventually advanced into the grand-final that was held in May 26. Greece performed 16th on the final line-up. At the end of the show, the song only finished in 17th place with 64 points. Since Greece has been known to be the most successful country in the contest after the introduction of the semi-final round in 2004 and had placed within the top-ten position after advancing into the finals every year, this record was eventually broken.

Split results

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12 points
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Points awarded to Greece

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  • 5 points4 points3 points2 points1 point