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North Macedonia participated in the 2019 Eurovision Song Contest in Tel Aviv, Israel with the song “Proud” written by Darko Dimitrov, Robert Bilbilov, Lazar Cvetkoski, Kosta Petrov and Sanja Popovska. The song was performed by Tamara Todevska. The song qualified from the semifinal, gained 305 points and placed 7th in the final, winning the jury vote. This was North Macedonia's first top ten placement and also the highest placement ever for North Macedonia in the history of the contest.
Prior to the 2019 contest, North Macedonia had participated in the Eurovision Song Contest eighteen times since its first entry in 1998 as F.Y.R. Macedonia. The nation's best result in the contest to this point was twelfth, which it achieved in 2006 with the song "Ninanajna" performed by Elena Risteska. Following the introduction of semi-finals for the 2004, Macedonia had featured in only five finals. In 2018, Eye Cue failed to bring the country to the final with their song "Lost and Found", that marked the nation's sixth failure in a row.
Before Eurovision
Internal selection
On 25 January 2019, MRT announced that Tamara Todevska would represent North Macedonia in the 2019 contest. She previously represented North Macedonia in 2008 along with Vrčak and Adrian with the song Let Me Love You where they failed to qualify for the final.
Song release
North Macedonia's entry, "Proud", was initally planned for release on March 4th, but it was delayed to March 8th to coincide with International Women's Day. The song was released on the official Eurovision Song Contest YouTube channel. "Proud" is an acoustic, piano and string-driven ballad, with the topic of empowerment, especially about women empowerment and Tamara's two children, Hana and Daren.
At Eurovision
According to Eurovision rules, all nations with the exceptions of the host country and the "Big 5" (France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom) are required to qualify from one of two semi-finals in order to compete for the final; the top ten countries from each semi-final progress to the final. The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) split up the competing countries into six different pots based on voting patterns from previous contests, with countries with favourable voting histories put into the same pot. On 28 January 2019, a special allocation draw was held which placed each country into one of the two semi-finals, as well as which half of the show they would perform in. North Macedonia was placed into the second semi-final, to be held on 16 May 2019, and was scheduled to perform in the second half of the show.
Once all the competing songs for the 2019 contest had been released, the running order for the semi-finals was decided by the shows' producers rather than through another draw, so that similar songs were not placed next to each other. North Macedonia was set to perform in position 17, following the entry from Netherlands and preceding the entry from Azerbaijan.
Voting
Voting during the three shows involved each country awarding two sets of points from 1-8, 10 and 12: one from their professional jury and the other from televoting. Each nation's jury consisted of five music industry professionals who are citizens of the country they represent, with their names published before the contest to ensure transparency. This jury judged each entry based on: vocal capacity; the stage performance; the song's composition and originality; and the overall impression by the act. In addition, no member of a national jury was permitted to be related in any way to any of the competing acts in such a way that they cannot vote impartially and independently. The individual rankings of each jury member as well as the nation's televoting results will be released shortly after the grand final.
Points awarded to North Macedonia
Parts of this article (those related to the incorrect Belarusian jury result) need to be updated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. (May 2019)
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