It’s been confirmed that Madonna will play at this year’s Eurovision Song Contest.
Representatives for Madonna confirmed to NME that the musician will perform two songs at the final on May 18 in Tel Aviv.
Earlier today, the news was also seemingly confirmed to Haaretz by the European Broadcasting Union. According to their reports, one of the songs played by Madonna will be a well-known single whilst the other will be a new song.
There are reports that the singer’s appearance at the contest will cost around $1 million and that Tel Aviv businessman Sylvan Adams will pay the bill.
Last year, Israel’s Netta Barzilai won the content with the song ‘Toy’. Since the win, a number of leading artists including Wolf Alice, Brian Eno and The Knife – together with a number of former Eurovision finalists – called for a boycott of the 2019 contest in Israel.
In an open letter to The Guardian the artists called for a boycott of the event, stating: “Until Palestinians can enjoy freedom, justice and equal rights to all humans, there should be no business-as-usual with the state that is denying them their basic rights.”
The letter added: “We understand that the European Broadcasting Union is demanding that Israel finds a ‘non-divisive’ location for the 2019 Eurovision. It should cancel Israel’s hosting of the contest altogether and move it to another country with a better human rights record…Injustice divides while the pursuit of dignity and human rights unites.”
Meanwhile, Madonna last week seemingly teased that her new album could finally be on the way, after uploading a grid of mysterious images to Instagram.
The Queen of Pop posted nine individual images on Instagram that link up to reveal a red ‘X’ against a striking black background.
In January, Madonna also shared what is thought to be studio footage from an upcoming track.