A Rough Guide To Melodifestivalen Final

So, as any reader should have noticed by now Melodifestivalen, The Final takes place in Globen this week. So what is in store. Well after four semi-finals and Andra Chansen we have ten songs to go before eleven international juries and the Swedish televoting public.

The Contestants

1. David Lindgren - Shout It Out 
2. Thorsten Flinck Och Revolutionsorkestern - Jag Reser Mig Igen 
3. Dead By April - Mystery
4. Lisa Miskovsky - Why Start A Fire
5. Top Cats - Baby Doll
6. Loreen - Euphoria
7. Ulrik Munther - Soldiers
8. Bjorn Ranelid ft. Sara Li - Mirakel
9. Molly Sandén - Why Am I Crying
10. Danny Saucedo - Amazing

The Scene

In spite of what some fans have said this is shaping up to be a better Melodifestivalen final than the last two years. Nevertheless if your a Eurovision, Melodifestivalen or just someone with nothing to do between 8pm and 10pm CET you should be watching the Melodifestivalen Final. It is always exciting, particularly with the advent of the international juries (I don't have a clue who sits on them or how their picked and would love to know do get in touch if you know).

The Deciders

The winner is decided on by international juries in: Belgium, Bosnia & Herzegovia, UK, Estonia, France Cyprus, Ireland, Malta, Norway, Germany and Ukraine. They award 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 and 12 points to their favourite songs. according to Christer Bjorkman, Melodifestivalen producer, the international juries understand how seriously Swedes take Melodifestivalen. 

In terms of trivia France, Ireland and Norway have had juries in the voting for the last two years. Of these Ireland is the most accurate having given the eventual winner 10 points on both occasions. Norway averages 4 and France 6. Of the countries this year UK and Malta were the only ones to award 12 points to Popular last year.

473 points are then distributed to the 10 songs as a percentage proportionate to their percentage in the public televote. The winner is the song with the most points. Since 1999 televoting has been used continuously in Melodifestivalen. With the exception of 2005 and 2008, the winner of the televote has won the overall competition.

The Odds and the Polls

Every year a countless number of polls and odds come out. Eurovision fan poll results are broadly consistent with the results of Melodifestivalen (With the noteable exception of 2010). The leader of the polls (both Eurovision fan polls and internal Swedish polls) would suggest Loreen will win. Most people suggest that this is a straight two way fight between Loreen and Danny but Melodifestivalen is never that clear cut. I think that Molly Sandén or Thorsten Flinck could emerge as a dark horse. Bookies are largely in line with this view point.

So we will have more on Melodifestivalen this week, but in the mean time we have a little surprise for you which we will unveil during the week. We don't know if you will like it but hopefully you will.

P.S. Vote on our poll for Melodifestivalen on the top left of the blog.

News Wrap-Up: Saturday 3rd March

Firstly Spain, Estonia and Lithuania have selected their songs for this years Eurovision. Spain have selected Quédate Conmigo which is a very good song. I am a tiny, tiny bit uneasy about it I think there is a small bit of depth missing from the performance but we will have to wait until May to see whether it works on the Eurovision Stage.

Estonia selected Ott Lepland to represent them in Baku. His song for Baku "Kuula" is very deep and is fairly strong.  I do still maintain this was a poor choice and there was better in the competition. I really hope they keep it in Estonian. 

Lithuania have decided to send Donny Montel with his song Love is Blind to Baku. This was the favourite, though certainly not mine. Anyway we'll talk about these things later.

Anyhow in other news:

• In Melodifestivalen to most fans disappointment - including my own, Top Cats got through to the final with Thorsten Flinck. 
• Keeping with Melodifestivalen 2012 early odds and polls would suggest that Loreen should win. We will have full coverage of Melodifestivalen this week and will have a big post tomorrow night.
• A snippet of the Azeri song has appeared online. You can listen to it here, though from the snippet it does not exactly fill me with confidence of an amazing Azeri song at Eurovision. 
• Sean Banan did an excellent parody of Danny Saucedo's Melodifestivalen song which you can watch here.

I'll have a piece up on Melodifestivalen Final sometime tonight.