national selection

There have been speculations for several weeks, but now it is official. There will be no fourth edition of the German national final "Unser Star für …". As it was announced the private TV channel ProSieben will end the cooperation with the national broadcaster ARD – at least temporarily.

Today the swedish broadcaster SVT revealed the hosting cities of the national selection Melodifestivalen 2013. The MF-tour will start with the first Semifinal in Karlskrona on 2 February and end with the final in Friends Arena on 9 March. The host city of ESC 2013 Malmö will be the host of the fourth Semifinal.

The nine songs that will take part in the national selection have been released through the website of the children's television channel, Ketnet, where the music videos of all the entrants can be watched. All candidates will have a professional training program with the best coaches in their field.

Georgia have selected three girls and one boy to represent them at the 2012 Junior Eurovision Song Contest in Amsterdam.  The band currently do not have a name and at the moment are being referred to as the 'fantastic four'. 

Earlier this week it was confirmed by swedish broadcaster SVT that the national selection Melodifestivalen is to be held in the new Friends Arena on the 9 of March 2013. As Sweden is tipped high among the bookmakers it looks like SVT is preparing for next year’s Eurovision Song Contest by announcing that Melodifestivalen will be held there.

After a long row of national finals we have come to an end with the Belgium selection being held tonight. The Belgium TV viewers decided that Iris will be representing them at this year's Eurovision Song Contest with the song Would You?. 

This year's festival will be a tribute to the Portuguese most traditional music genre, fado, which a few months ago was added to UNESCO's list of World's Intangible Cultural Heritage. Without having heard the candidate songs, we know that the 12 competing acts will have at least this common feature.

The four songs competing to represent Greece at this year's Eurovision Song Contest have been released by the broadcaster for online listening. They will compete for the ticket to Baku on the 12th of March. Who do you think will get it? See the new videos and make up your mind.

After an exciting evening the Spanish song for the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest is now known. Three entries were competing for the win and the decision was made by a mixed system of televoting and jurors. Quédate Conmigo was the favourite from the beginning and there were no surprises in the result.

Tonight Sweden held it's Second chance heat which is the last heat before the final in Globen on the 10th of March. This was a new chance for the 3rd and 4th placed songs from the four previous heats to qualify to the final.