September 19th at 17:59 CET was the deadline for composers to submit their songs to Melodifestivalen 2017, and Sveriges Television (SVT) has revealed that a total of 2,478 songs have been received.
There are “about as many entries as last year and it is a manageable and healthy level”, said Christer Björkman. The executive supervisor of the competition stated he believes that given the success on the Swedish charts of some of last year’s songs, new composers have decided to send their work.
Now it is time for the jury to decide which songs will make the final cut and will be competing in Melodifestivalen 2017, becoming potential candidates to represent Sweden in the next Eurovision Song Contest. This year’s jury will be under the leadership of the new jury Chairman and Deputy Contest Producer Karin Gunnarsson, who has worked at Sveriges Radio P3 as a music editor for over ten years. She first started working in Melodifestivalen in 2013 and has been a jury member since then.
The only confirmed act is ‘Les Gordons’, who won the prize to compete in Melodifestivalen 2017 after they triumphed in the radio contest Svensktoppen Nästa, even though the band will not compete with the same song that won them the prize since the ones in the contest must be newly written.
The names of the artists that will compete in the next edition of Melodifestivalen will be announced in the autumn.
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