Open Nippon

Open Nippon
Genre	Song contest
Country of origin	Japan
Number of seasons	1
Release
Original network	NHK
Original release	10 June 2022 – present

Open Nippon (or Open Nippon Song Competition) is a song competition organised by NHK (Japanese public broadcasters) every six months. It determines the country's representative for the WorldVision Song Contest, and has been running since summer 2022.

Origins

The first "Open Nippon" was held on 10 June 2022 at Tokyo Metropolitan Gymnasium in Tokyo. Six songs participated. Six "expert" juries from ather countries and the puplic (in the proportion of 75% to 25%) decided the winner. The competition was won by Nao Aihara performing "Lighthouse".

Participation

To be eligible, performers must be at least sixteen years of age on the day of the first Worldvision semi-final. 6 entries are invited to the competition, of which at least four must be submitted by performers from Japan. Both solo performers and duets, musical groups are allowed to participate. At least half of the entries must be in Japanese.

Hosting

As planned by the organizers, the song contest should be held in different cities of the country from season to season. So the first season was decided to be held in Tokyo, which will not be able to host the selection of the next season.

Format

It is planned that the competition will be held in one round (final) when only six songs will take part.

Voting

The six members of the jury (75% of all votes) and the puplic (25% of all votes) will take part in the voting. Each of the six members of the jury will have a set of points: 10, 7, 5, 3, 2 and 1 point. The results of the public vote were translated into a system of points: 20, 14, 10, 3, 2 and 1 point.

Winners

Season	Host	Winner	Language(s)	Place at Worldvision
Summer'22	Tokyo	Nao Aihara - Lighthouse	Japanese, English	TBA 23 July 2022
Winter'23	Okinawa	TBA 9 December 2022