Romania participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2011 in Düsseldorf, Germany and selected their entry through a televised national final, organised by Romanian broadcaster Televiziunea Română. "Hotel FM" were victorious with their song "Change" and thus represented the country in the 2011 contest.
Before Eurovision
Selecţia Naţională 2011
On 1 October, Romanian national television announced that the national final would take place on the New Year's Eve show. 13 acts were to complete in a televised show.
Competing entries
The deadline for entries was set for 5 November 2010. On 15 November 2010, during a press conference held by TVR, 13 finalists were announced along with videos produced by the broadcaster. The draw of the running order took place at Marina Almasan-Socaciu's TV show, Ne vedem la TVR! on 20 November 2010.
Final
The final was held on 31 December 2010 at the TVR TV Studios in Bucharest, hosted by Paula Seling, Ovi and Gianina Corondan. The winner was determined by the 50/50 combination of the votes from a jury panel and public televoting. The winning entry was "Change" performed by Hotel FM, receiving the maximum number of points from the jury and came second in the televote. The winning composer was awarded this time a BMW 3 Series. It was for the second year that the winning composer received a car. Former Eurovision winnersJohnny Logan as well as Niamh Kavanagh were the special guests of the evening. Chiara Siracusa also made an appearance.
Promotion
A special concert took place on April 9 in Bucharest. Four Eurovision contestants performed their entries live at the Nichita Stanescu hall. The concert was broadcast live by TVR 1 and TVR International while a live webcast was provided by Esctoday.com. Kati Wolf, the Hungarian entry, was also invited, but she was busy, and couldn't perform at this special concert.
Country
Artist
Song
Dino Merlin
"Love in Rewind"
Zdob si Zdub
"So lucky"
Hotel FM
"Change"
TWiiNS
"I'm still alive"
Artists from five countries visited Romania during their Eurovision promo tours:
Country
Artist
Song
Date
Poli Genova
"Na inat"
March 19
Alexey Vorobyov
"Get You"
April 2
Dino Merlin
"Love in Rewind"
April 9
Zdob si Zdub
"So lucky"
April 9
TWiiNS
"I'm still alive"
April 9
At Eurovision
Romania competed in the second half of the second semi-final of the contest, on 12 May. It qualified for the great final, with a total of 111 points. During the 14 May final, Romanian performed the 17th and ended up on the same position, in a tie with Russia, with a total of 77 points. It received the maximum 12 points from Moldova and Italy, 10 points from Belgium, 8 points from Spain, 6 points from: Bulgaria, Azerbaijan and Israel, 5 points from Turkey, 4 points from Netherlands and Denmark and 1 point from Austria, Hungary, Ireland and Estonia.
Split results
In the Semi-final 2 Romania came 4th with 111 points: the public awarded Romania 3rd place with 121 points and the jury awarded 5th place with 85 points.
In the Final Romania came 17th with 77 points: the public awarded Romania 14th place with 79 points and the jury awarded 13th place with 86 points.
