Albania: "World" finally released

After a day's delay, Lindita had finally released the revamp of her Festivali i Këngës winning song, "Botë". The new version of the song will represent Albania at the 62nd Eurovision Song Contest in Kyiv.

When Lindita won Festivali i Këngës 55 at the end of December, her song "Botë" became the first Eurovision entry for 2017. It has been known for a while that Lindita would be revamping the song for Eurovision, due in part to the Festivali i Këngës version being over 3 minutes, but also due to her desire to sing in English. "World", which was initially intended to be released yesterday evening (Sunday 12th March) on Albanian news but was delayed until today, has not only been translated entirely into English, but has a reworked instrumentation which was recorded with a live orchestra.

Listen to Lindita's "World" below:

Lindita, whose full name is Lindita Halimi, is 27 years old and was born in Vitina, Kosovo. She first rose to fame after participating in the third season of Ethet, where she placed in the top 10. In 2014 she took part in Festivali i Këngës for the first time, finishing in third place with the song "S’të fal". She went on to take part in American Idol, but was knocked out before the final twenty four singers were selected. She won Festivali i Këngës in December after topping the jury vote by 28 points. However, she finished 3rd in the televote.

Lindita will compete in the first semi-final of this year's Eurovision on Tuesday 9th May. She will hope to take Albania back to the Eurovision final after last year's entrant, Eneda Tarifa, finished in 16th with her song "Fairytale".

Albania in the Eurovision Song Contest

Albania debuted in the Eurovision Song Contest in 2004, when they were represented by Anjeza Shahini. She performed the song "The Image of You" in Istanbul and finished in 7th place in the final, scoring 106 points. Albania has only finished in the top 10 on one other occasion to date, when Rona Nishliu represented them in 2012 with the song "Suus". Finishing in 5th place, "Suus" is Albania's best-scoring entry to date.