UK’s host city will need to cancel events to make room for Eurovision 2023

The UK’s host city for Eurovision 2023 will be forced to cancel a number of other scheduled events at its chosen venue in order to make room for next year’s annual song contest.

The UK, whose entrant Sam Ryder finished second to Ukraine’s Kalush Orchestra in this year’s competition, will host Eurovision 2023 on behalf of Ukraine due to the ongoing war in the latter country.

The shortlist of potential host cities is set to be announced tomorrow (August 12), with Manchester, Newcastle, Bristol, Sheffield and Birmingham all thought to be in contention.

Any hopeful host city must have a 10,000-capacity arena “that should be within easy reach of an international airport and with ample hotel accommodation”, according to the guidelines that have been shared by host broadcaster the BBC and organisers the European Broadcasting Union.

However, as BBC News reports, no large arena in the UK currently has enough of a gap in its listings to host Eurovision in May 2023.

A number of council leaders have told the BBC that the competition’s organisers would need access to the selected venue six to eight weeks ahead of the contest, meaning that a number of already-scheduled live events at said venue would need to be scrapped or rescheduled in order to accommodate Eurovision.

Artists including Elton John, Celine Dion and André Rieu are set to be touring in a number of the UK’s arena cities in April and May 2023. None of these dates have been cancelled or affected as of yet, with a final decision on the venue for Eurovision 2023 set to be made in the autumn.

In other Eurovision news, ABBA’s Agnetha Fältskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad have paid tribute to the late Olivia Newton-John following the latter’s passing earlier this week.

The ABBA pair crossed paths with the late star in 1974 when both ABBA and Newton-John competed in that year’s Eurovision in Brighton.