Sweden: Insight into the Melodifestivalen 2024 1st heat songs! | SVT Pre-Listening Event

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Melodifestivalen 2024 first show is on the forthcoming Saturday, February the 3rd, which will take place at Malmö Arena in Malmö.

What to expect

Already in this competition, the first of five, there will be an interlude with a capital I when the hit group A-Teens reunites to celebrate their 25th anniversary. For the first time in eighteen years , Marie Serneholt, Sara Lumholdt, Dhani Lennevald and Amit Paul are now appearing together, and will offer a cracking medley with both their own songs and some of ABBA‘s songs.

The Pre-listening Process

This year, we are invited to the pre-listening event that SVT holds every Tuesday at 10am CET, before each of the five heats of Melodifestivalen 2024, or as it is called “Förhandslyssningen“. Approximately 50 people, carefully selected by SVT are invited to listen the entire songs of each heat in the pre-listening events. So, we had the chance to listen to the entire running order of this week’s heat twice.

But how do the songs of this heat sound like?

    • “Supernatural” – Adam Woods
      Writers: Jonna Hall, Calle Hellberg, William Segerdahl and Adam Woods.

    It’s an EDM pop, reminds me of Avicii bangers. Amazing vocals, great production, but everything is there for a reason. When it gets staged it will sure be an immersive experience. Feels like you’re drowning in love. Would love to see him as a DTF!

    • “Hela världen väntar” – Samir & Viktor
      Writers:David Kreuger, Fredrik Kempe, Niklas Carson Mattsson

    Typical Samir & Viktor song in Swedish, of course an “oj oj oj” part would be there. This song will surely involve the crowds a lot. I secretly danced to it while listening. Low-key reminds me of “Ay Mamá“ by Rigoberta Bandini, Benidorm 2022.

    • “Min melodi” – Melina Borglowe
      Writers:Andreas Mattsson, Melina Borglowe, Thomas G:son

    It’s a guitar-based pop song with obvious indie elements. I can hear Thomas G:Son contribution to the song. Melina‘s voice is ethereal. Would this qualify directly to the finals though? Not sure, but a pleasant song overall.

    • “Forever Yours” – Elisa Lindström
      Writers:Elisa Lindström, Erik Bernholm, Henric Axelsson, Henrik Sethsson, Thomas G:son

    Schlager party is the theme, if you know what I mean. I can picture it with lots of light. Elisa does what Sweden knows to do best. High notes and an ear-candy key change! Hope this works on stage too!

    • “Awful Liar” – Lisa Ajax
      Writers:David Lindgren Zacharias, Sebastian Atas, Victor Crone, Victor Sjöström

    A love power-ballad for Lisa this year. Reminds me of a Natalie Imbruglia ballad. Guitar and strings on the plate for a hapily sad song. Beautiful song.

    • “Heroes Are Calling” – Smash Into Pieces
      Writers:Andreas ”Giri” Lindbergh, Benjamin Jennebo, Chris Adam Hedman Sörbye, Jimmy “Joker” Thörnfeldt, Joy Deb, Linnea Deb, Per Bergquist

    Their distinctive sound is there, stronger than their entry last year in my opinion. Low BPM but amazing production to the last touch. Is this song a contender for the win? Let’s find out. I think it is.

Our thoughts

It is hard to decide, the victory of Loreen has stepped up the game and everyone has done a great job this year. After the second listen, I would expect Adam Woods or Elisa Lindström and Smash into Pieces to be the DTF acts and Adam Woods or Elisa Lindström along with Lisa Ajax to remain in the competition.

Their staging remains to be seen so that we can have a clear picture of the finalists of this Heat. We will have a clear view tomorrow morning, when their first rehearsals start on stage, at Malmö Arena.

The show

Carina Berg is the host of all the shows of the tour this year! With the next show of the contest on Saturday February the 3rd, Melodifestivalen will take place in Malmö, then Göteborg follows and finally the final show in Stockholm on the 9th of March.

The schedule for the six shows of the Melodifestivalen 2024 tour

  • Heat 1: Saturday 3 February 2024, Malmö Arena, Malmö
  • Heat 2: Saturday 10 February 2024, Scandinavium, Göteborg
  • Heat 3: Saturday 17 February 2024, Vida Arena, Växjö
  • Heat 4: Saturday 24 February 2024, Stiga Sports Arena, Eskilstuna
  • Heat 5: Saturday 2 March 2024, Löfbergs Arena, Karlstad
  • Final: Saturday 9 March 2024, Friends Arena, Stockholm – Solna

Which two of the above artists do you think will be the direct qualifiers to the finals? Let us know in the comments section below.

Stay tuned at Eurovisionfun, for all the latest developments regarding Melodifestivalen 2024 and the Swedish entry for Eurovision 2024!

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Christer Björkman: “We will be effective and we will be able to shorten the show!” | Exclusive Interview

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Andreas Papayiannakis and EurovisionFun was invited along with a limited number of media by SVT, to attend the official hand-over ceremony of the contest hosting, from the City of Liverpool to the City of Malmö and the Eurovision Allocation Draw which was broadcast live on eurovision.tv and Ertflix tonight.

There we had the chance to meet several of the people involved in the production of the contest, the Mayor of the City of Malmö Katrin Stjernfeldt Jammeh, the Program Executive of the City of Malmö Karin Karlsson, Eurovision Executive Producer Ebba Adielsson, and Show Producer Christer Björkman.

Christer Björkman spoke exclusively to us about his comeback and more. Christer has been a show producer for five times, now he’s coming back for the sixth time. But how does it feel to be back? Was he planning on his return? Christer said:

“No, I mean to me it was something that I have left behind me and I felt I was done with it. But then when they called and said, you know, we want you, we need you, it’s very hard to say no to Eurovision. You know that, we all know that, we’re fans, you know, in the back of our bones we’re fans. And I’m very proud to be back.”

SVT has always been a trendsetter throughout the years and now with the help of Christer, they are planning on cutting down on the show for up to one hour this year. Christer clarifies:

“Well, we’re trying to be effective. We set up a goal for ourselves to have a show that is 3.30, which is roughly what it was in Malmo last time. That’s sort of the national ego that makes us do that and having done this in Sweden quite recently, you know, in 2016 and we did 2013, so we don’t have to do all that over and over again. So we will be effective and we will be able to shorten it. Maybe not all the way to 3.30, but not far from it.”

Christer has done so many great shows in the past, so his opinion on competing songs and staging matters a lot. So we asked him what he thinks of the Cypriot entry “Liar” and Silia Kapsis! Christer admitted he has listened to the song of Cyprus and got really enthusiastic about telling us his opinion about it:

“Oh my God, I have. I think it’s a very good song. I have not seen Silia live, so I cannot judge the artist’s ability when it comes to a live performance. But the recording is great and I love the song. And it will definitely be one of the songs that I will be very keen on to work with because I think it can be a really good stage performance as well. So that one is good.”

The last time there has been a comment like this about a Greek or Cypriot entry, was back in 2018 with the participation of Cyprus with Eleni Foureira and the song “Fuego“.

You can watch our exclusive interview with Christer Björkman at the video down below:

Special thanks to SVT for inviting us and the City of Malmö for the great hosting at this lovely ceremony, but also many many more that are about to come.

Stay tuned at Eurovisionfun and don’t miss out on anything regarding our most loved contest!

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Eurovision 2024: The Semi-Final Allocation Draw Results!

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Malmö with a very nice event hosted a few minutes ago the draw for the semi-finals of the 68th Eurovision Song Contest.

The analyzes of the fans and not only, have been on fire for a few minutes now. Since the theories based on the pre-history of the countries in the competition, it is a first insight into how passable the qualification to the final is or not. In other words, it’s time to make our predictions, about who will go through to the final and who are the favorites to say goodbye to Malmö early…

The presenters and the handover ceremony

Presenters of the Eurovision 2024 semi-final draw were Pernilla Månsson Colt and Farah Abadi. It is worth mentioning that Pernilla Månsson Colt was also the presenter of the corresponding draw in 2013, eleven years ago when Malmö hosted the Eurovision Song Contest for the last time. Both of them are part of the SVT staff, being some of the most beloved faces of the Swedish state broadcaster.

During the draw, the ceremony of handing over and accepting the emblem of the contest took place. The mayor of Liverpool, Steven Rotheram, formally handed over the “keys to the event” to the mayor of Malmö, Katrin Stjernfeldt Jammeh.

Draw Procedure

Big 5 and Sweden

With the big winner of last year’s competition, Sweden, directly in the final, along with the Big 5 (UK, France, Italy, Germany, Spain), the first part of the draw determined the semi-final that the direct finalists would vote for.

Will vote in the 1st Semi-Final:

  • Sweden
  • United Kingdom
  • Germany

Will vote in the 2nd Semi-Final:

  • Spain
  • Italy
  • France

In the semi-final that the six aforementioned countries were drawn to broadcast and vote for, the video from their dress rehearsal will also be shown. This was done at Eurovision 2016 for the first time, for reasons of equal exposure of the countries directly in the final and the countries that qualify from the semi-finals. Essentially, viewers see each entry twice during the shows.

Semi-Final Allocation Draw

The allocation draw for the two semi-finals had two parts. In the first part the 31 countries participating in the semi-finals were drawn in which of the two they will compete in. Fifteen countries will compete in the first semi-final and sixteen in the second semi-final.

In the second part, each country learned whether it will appear in the first or second half of the semi-final in which it will compete. The exact order of appearance will be determined by the EBU and the show’s producers at a later date.

1st Semi-final (May 7):

1st Half

  • Ukraine
  • Cyprus
  • Poland
  • Serbia
  • Lithuania
  • Croatia
  • Ireland

2nd Half

  • Slovenia
  • Iceland
  • Finland
  • Portugal
  • Luxembourg
  • Australia
  • Azerbaijan
  • Moldova

2nd Semi-Final (May 9):

1st Half

  • Austria
  • Malta
  • Switzerland
  • Greece
  • Czechia
  • Albania
  • Denmark
  • Armenia

2nd Half

  • Israel
  • Estonia
  • Georgia
  • Netherlands
  • Norway
  • Latvia
  • San Marino
  • Belgium

Malmö will host the 68th Eurovision Song Contest from 7 to 11 May at the Malmö Arena. The motto of this year’s event, as chosen by the organisers, is “United by Music“, retaining the motto first chosen for last year’s contest in Liverpool.

You can see the draw again through the link below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_-2hMEq5sk

Stay tuned to Eurovisionfun for all the developments regarding Eurovision 2024!

 

Eurovision 2024: Tonight the Allocation Draw!

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At 19:00 CET and live from Malmö, Sweden, the draw for the Eurovision 2024 semi-finals will take place tonight.

During today’s event, there will also be a handover of the event’s banner from the city of Liverpool to the city of Malmö. For this reason, both the Mayor of Liverpool, Steven Rotheram, and the Mayor of the Swedish city, Katrin Stjernfeldt Jammeh, will be present at today’s draw.

The hosts

The hosts of tonight’s draw for the semi-finals of the 68th Eurovision Song Contest will be Pernilla Månsson Colt and Farah Abadi. It is worth mentioning that Pernilla Månsson Colt was the presenter of the equivalent draw in 2013, eleven years ago when Malmö hosted the Eurovision Song Contest for the last time.

The draw procedure

The first part of the draw will determine which semi-final will be broadcast and voted for by each of the six countries that are directly in the final on 11 May (Sweden, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, and the United Kingdom).

The second part of the draw will determine which semi-final and which half the other 31 participating countries will compete in. As in recent years, the exact order of appearance will be determined by the event producers at a later date.

The 31 countries have been divided into five pots, based on historical voting patterns as calculated by Eurovision’s official voting partner, Digame.

Drawing countries from different pots aims to reduce the likelihood of so-called neighbour voting and increases the suspense in the semi-finals.

Pots

Pot 1
  • 🇦🇱 Albania
  • 🇦🇹 Austria
  • 🇨🇭 Switzerland
  • 🇭🇷 Croatia
  • 🇷🇸 Serbia
  • 🇸🇮 Slovenia
Pot 2
  • 🇦🇺 Australia
  • 🇩🇰 Denmark
  • 🇪🇪 Estonia
  • 🇫🇮 Finland
  • 🇮🇸 Iceland
  • 🇳🇴 Norway
Pot 3
  • 🇦🇲 Armenia
  • 🇦🇿 Azerbaijan
  • 🇬🇪 Georgia
  • 🇮🇱 Israel
  • 🇱🇻 Latvia
  • 🇱🇹 Lithuania
  • 🇺🇦 Ukraine
Pot 4
  • 🇨🇾 Cyprus
  • 🇬🇷 Greece
  • 🇮🇪 Ireland
  • 🇲🇹 Malta
  • 🇵🇹 Portugal
  • 🇸🇲 San Marino
Pot 5
  • 🇧🇪 Belgium
  • 🇨🇿 Czechia
  • 🇱🇺 Luxembourg
  • 🇳🇱 Netherlands
  • 🇲🇩 Moldova
  • 🇵🇱 Poland

https://twitter.com/Eurovision/status/1751972070479565001

So in the evening, we all tune in for the draw of the semi-finals of our favourite contest. You can watch the draw on the official Eurovision channel on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_-2hMEq5sk

Stay tuned to Eurovisionfun for all the developments regarding Eurovision 2024!

Sweden: First look at this year’s Melodifestivalen stage!

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The design of this year’s Melodifestivalen stage has been completed and SVT unveiled a sketch/working image of how the final stage looks like, before it gets constructed at Malmö Arena in Malmö . It can now be seen in a post at the official social media accounts of the contest and SVT.

Gigantic LED walls with light and video in all directions, glamorous party atmosphere as well as modern, glittery elegance – and a closeness between artists and audience. That’s what the creators of Melodifestivalen‘s stage and light design want to achieve. Scenographer Viktor Brattström, who together with the lighting design team with Fredrik Stormby at the helm has developed this year’s stage and light design says:

“The stage can offer great variety and the arena feeling will be elegant and festive, both joy and excitement are promised. Everyone will recognize themselves in the wonderful and lively party feeling. That feeling is always part of Melodifestivalen’s identity.”

LED and all are the concepts of the season. Two angled LED walls with integrated luminaires flank the stage, which rests on a 72 square metre LED floor. Thanks to a high resolution of the LED floor, there are a record number of pixels to play with, and it becomes a fun and useful surface. The experience of the different contributions can be greatly enhanced, according to the design team.

To increase the closeness between the audience and the performers, a narrow playing area is placed in the stalls, some distance from the stage, and creates alternative positions for the Melodifestivalen host. A variety of lamps in the stalls further helps to blur the boundary between stage and audience.

Artistic and technical work hand in hand

The prerequisites for the year have been, among other things, that design and construction should work longer over time, and that everything should also fit in smaller arenas. During the design work, great focus has been placed on the big picture. Included in this is everything from the content of the LED screens (in addition to the contributions), lighting, Green Room and interludes, to the host’s clothes and more. For example, the design team has chosen powder pink as one of the shades that is repeated throughout the arena design, on everything from balloons to the lighting over the audience.

Working with the whole in this way is both artistic and technical work that requires close and dynamic teamwork between some of Melodifestivalen‘s key creators – lighting designers, scenographers, image producers, other producers, number creators and project managers. All of them develop a number of basic practical and design prerequisites from their respective areas. Viktor Brattström adds:

“A challenge this year has been to become more compact without losing sight of the grandeur and dynamism. We believe we have succeeded. I am grateful to have been a part of this event and its development over the years.”

Melodifestivalen 2024 is scheduled to take place between February 3rd to March 9th, and next year’s 30 competing songs were selected by SVT among 2624 songs.

The schedule for the six shows of the Melodifestivalen 2024 tour

  • Heat 1: Saturday 3 February 2024, Malmö Arena, Malmö
  • Heat 2: Saturday 10 February 2024, Scandinavium, Göteborg
  • Heat 3: Saturday 17 February 2024, Vida Arena, Växjö
  • Heat 4: Saturday 24 February 2024, Stiga Sports Arena, Eskiltuna
  • Heat 5: Saturday 2 March 2024, Löfbergs Arena, Karlstad
  • Final: Saturday 9 March 2024, Friends Arena, Stockholm – Solna

What is your favourite participant of Melodifestivalen 2024? Let us know in the comments section below!

The winner of Melodifestivalen 2023 and hence the Swedish representative at Eurovision 2023 was Loreen with her song “Tattoo“. Loreen went to become the first female artist in history to win the Eurovision Song Contest twice.

Do you like the Melodifestivalen 2024 stage? Let us know in the comments section below!

Source: SVT

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Sweden: The lyrics of the songs competing at the first heat of Melodifestivalen 2024!

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The upcoming heat of Melodifestivalen 2024 will take place next Saturday, February the 3rd and will take place at Malmö Arena in Malmö.

A while ago, SVT, the Swedish national broadcaster released the lyrics of all six competing songs, of this upcoming heat.

Read more

Eurovision 2024: Eurovisionfun attending the Semi-Final allocation draw, on-site in Malmö!

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For the first time, a Greek media outlet will be on-site, in the process of the Semi-Final allocation draw of Eurovision. It is with great pleasure and honour that we have been invited by SVT along a limited number of media to cover the event and we will be live in Malmö, tomorrow Tuesday 30/1 and we will be serving you with rich content in all our platforms about the entire process and what is going on at the city of Malmö, a bit less than four months before the contest takes place.

Among a limited number of media, Eurovisionfun is present in the draw

Eurovisionfun, confirming the excellent relations it maintains with SVT, which is this year’s host broadcaster of the Eurovision Song Contest, will be one of limited number of media that will attend the process of the Semi-Final Allocation Draw of the countries participating in Eurovision Song Contest 2024 and the only Greek media outlet of the bunch!

The above is a great recognition for our website, which is now among the largest of its kind, thanks to your love and support!

So tune in both to our website and to all our social media on Tuesday 30/1, right before 19:00 CET, to watch in every detail this important event for this year’s Eurovision Song Contest.

What is the Semi-Final Allocation Draw?

This is an established event, during when the host city of the previous year hands-over the reins of the event to the next city to host the contest.

At the same time, the draw takes place and determines in which of the two semi-finals, as well as in which of the first or second half of them, the participating countries will compete. Finally, it is determined in which semi-final the countries that qualify directly for the final, namely the so-called “Big 5” (France, Germany, Spain, Italy and the United Kingdom), as well as the host country Sweden, will vote.

We remind you that you will be able to watch the draw through the official Eurovision Song Contest channel on YouTube.

Stay tuned to Eurovisionfun for all the latest news regarding Eurovision 2024!

 

 

 

Sweden: These artists want Israel banned from Eurovision! | SVT’s response: “The EBU decides!”

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As you may have read in one of our previous articles, Expressen was able to reveal this weekend that more than 1.000 Swedish artists are demanding that Israel be banned from Eurovision. This is due to the ongoing Middle-Eastern conflict between Israel and Hamas, which has claimed the lives of tens of thousands of civilians in Gaza.

Today, the list of all the artists was published by Expressen, including Eric Saade, Marlena Ernman, Timbuktu, also Medina and Jacqline, who are competing in Melodifestivalen this year, have also signed. Also the global star Robyn joined the petition. You can have a look on the full list of artists who signed here!

“Serious war crimes”

There have been calls to ban Israel from Eurovision 2024, like 1000 Swedish musicians that signed today a petition to the EBU against Israel outside NRK right during the first two weeks of MGP. In Iceland, more than 500 artists signed a petition asking RÚV to withdraw from the contest, while Silvia Night signed an open letter to the EBU asking to ban Israel. In Finland, 1300 artists signed a petition asking for Israel to be removed. The British representative Olly Alexander has also shared in public his opinion against Israel. Also just recently Montaigne signed an open letter to the EBU asking the ban of Israel from the contest and Ben Dolic joined her by doing the same. Now 1000 Swedish artists are demanding that Israel be stopped from participating in the Eurovision Song Contest. The petition reads:

“For more than 100 days, we have witnessed the Israeli army committing what leading human rights organizations describe as grave war crimes. The Eurovision Song Contest began as a peace project with the ambition to unite countries and citizens through music. Allowing Israel to participate undermines not only the spirit of the contest but the entire public service mission. It also sends the signal that governments can commit war crimes without consequences. That is why we appeal to the EBU: Exclude Israel from the Eurovision Song Contest 2024.“

SVT’s answer: “The EBU decides!”

SVT has, through Åsa Barsness, HR and Communications Director, published a response to the demands directed at them, on a press release:

“It is the EBU that decides who participates in the competition and as the host country, SVT relates to what the EBU decides. The human suffering in this deeply complex conflict is horrific. No one can be unmoved by the conditions in Gaza right now, or by the Hamas attack in Israel. We are also concerned about developments. We understand and respect that groups make their voices heard.”

She further writes that SVT has a dialogue with the EBU and hopes to be able to carry out Eurovision in the “best way, with the vision of uniting in music.“

Eurovision will be held in Malmö in May this year and Karin Karlsson is responsible for the city’s initiative. She talked about how they view the artists’ petition, to Expressen:

“We can’t influence whether Israel is in or not, that’s the EBU’s responsibility. We have said all along that everyone is welcome in Malmö.”

Source: Expressen, SVT
Photo: Alex Ljungdahl / Expressen

Stay tuned at Eurovisionfun for all the latest news regarding the Eurovision Song Contest!

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Eurovision 2024: The Semi-final allocation pots!

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The Semi-Final Allocation Draw 2024 will take place tomorrow Tuesday 30 January at 19:00 CET live from Malmo, alongside a ceremony which sees the Host City insignia pass from previous hosts Liverpool to Malmo.

https://youtu.be/Q_-2hMEq5sk

The draw will be hosted by Pernilla Månsson Colt and Farah Abadi and fans will be able to watch on the official Eurovision YouTube channel.

The Allocation Draw will determine whether countries participate in the First Semi-Final (Tuesday 7 May at 21:00 CEST) or the Second Semi-Final (Thursday 9 May at 21:00 CEST). Also randomly allocated is whether a country will perform in the first or second half of the Semi-Final they’ve drawn.

Semi-Final Allocation Draw: How does it work?

Sweden as the Host Country and reigning champion respectively, along with the other 6 members of the so-called ‘Big 6’ participating countries (France, Germany, Italy, Spain and United Kingdom) do not compete in the Semi-Finals, but their domestic audiences do get to vote in one of them… so before the competing countries are allocated a place in a Semi-Final, it will be randomly determined which of the Semi-Finals the Big 6 will each be allowed to vote on.

The next part of the draw will determine in which Semi-Final and in which half of the respective Semi-Final the other 31 participating countries will perform in.

Semi-Final Allocation Pots 2024

Pot 1

Pot 2

Pot 3
  • Albania
  • Austria
  • Switzerland
  • Croatia
  • Serbia
  • Slovenia
  • Denmark
  • Australia
  • Finland
  • Iceland
  • Norway
  • Estonia
  • Armenia
  • Azerbaijan
  • Georgia
  • Israel
  • Latvia
  • Lithuania
  • Ukraine

Pot 4

Pot 5

Pot 6
  • Cyprus
  • Greece
  • Ireland
  • Malta
  • Portugal
  • San Marino
  • Belgium
  • Czech Republic
  • Netherlands
  • Moldova
  • Poland
  • Luxembourg
  • France
  • Italy
  • Germany
  • Spain
  • United Kingdom
  • Sweden

 

Drawing countries from different pots helps to reduce the chance of so-called neighbourly voting and increases suspense in the Semi-Finals. You can get a good idea of how it will all work by watching the 2022 Allocation Draw on the official Eurovision YouTube channel.

The Eurovision Song Contest is due to take place on 7, 9 and 11 May 2024 in Malmo, Sweden, who won the Contest thanks to Loreen winning in 2023.

Stay tuned at Eurovisionfun for all the updates!

Source: Eurovision.tv

Sweden: Around 1000 artists want Israel banned from Eurovision!

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Around 1,000 Swedish artists are demanding that Israel be banned from the Eurovision Song Contest, according to a petition that Expressen has taken part of. The document, which is currently being prepared to be handed over to the EBU writes:

“Put down the double standards, exclude Israel from the Eurovision Song Contest. For more than 100 days, we have witnessed the Israeli army committing what leading human rights organizations describe as grave war crimes.”

Among the artists who seem to have signed are musicians well-known in Sweden such as Alba August, Hoffmaestro, Jonathan Johansson, Malena Ernman, Markus Krunegård and Titiyo.

The EBU has previously excluded Russia and Belarus

The European Broadcasting Union announced in connection with Iceland‘s and Finland‘s appeal that Israel will not be excluded. Their position is that the Eurovision Song Contest is a contest between public service broadcasters rather than states.

However, the EBU has previously excluded countries from competing. In 2022, Russia was excluded due to the war against Ukraine. In 2021, Belarus was not allowed to participate in the competition after the EBU expelled the Belarusian public broadcaster BTRC for violating the EBU‘s press freedom rules.

There have been calls to ban Israel from Eurovision 2024, like outside NRK right before the first and second semi-finals of MGP. In Iceland, more than 500 artists signed a petition asking RÚV to withdraw from the contest, while Silvia Night signed an open letter to the EBU asking to ban Israel. In Finland, 1300 artists signed a petition asking for Israel to be removed. The British representative Olly Alexander has also shared in public his opinion against Israel. Also just recently Montaigne signed an open letter to the EBU asking the ban of Israel from the contest and Ben Dolic joined her by doing the same.

Source: Expressen
Photo: Jessica Gow / TT News Agency

Stay tuned at Eurovisionfun for all the latest news regarding the Eurovision Song Contest!

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