This Saturday’s second semi-final of Melodifestivalen will see the 1000th song performed in the history of the competition.
Speaking on the latest episode of the new Melfest Monday podcast, SVT’s Melodifestivalen expert Gustav Dahlander confirmed that landmark will be reached when WAHL feat. SAMI take to the stage with their song “90-talet”.
Gustav is responsible for The Contest Bible each year, and explained how he confirmed the news.
“This is the official interpretation, of course you can count in a number of different ways… I did a calculation and I checked with five different groups of other experts, and everyone agreed that it makes sense to say this is song number 1000.”
The 1000th song figure doesn’t take into account Sweden’s internally selected entry in 1958, Alice Babs with the song “Lilla stjärna”.
Melodifestivalen began in 1959, and has been staged almost every year since. Only in 1964, 1970 and 1976 did the competition not take place.
Saturday’s second semi-final is also historic with five debutants competing for a place in the final, with only Anton Ewald, Eva Rydberg (performing with Ewa Roos) and Dotter having competed previously in the contest.
An additional podcast from the team behind The Euro Trip, ‘Melfest Monday’ will release episodes each week covering the competition, with the second episode available now.
Feature Image Credit: EBU
About The Euro Trip
The Euro Trip is a podcast available on Acast, Apple Podcasts and Spotify with Rob Lilley and James Rowe bringing you a weekly show featuring big guests and fun games from the world of the Eurovision Song Contest.
Brought to you by Eurovoix, every Wednesday Rob and James will be bringing you interviews with some of the biggest names from the contest, finding out what makes them tick and giving us their memories of performing on the Eurovision stage.
Games will also keep the listeners entertained with the European Quiz and the One Second Song featuring in the weekly show. In addition, they’ll also bring you the very latest news.
Hosts Rob and James have been fans of the contest for well over a decade, with Rob having been the presenter of Eurovoix’s Eurojury for the past five years and James having produced the last two editions.
