Swedish~ Stereo~

Swedish Stereo is officially delighted with yesterday's winner of Eurovision-2011 - Ell & Nikki who participated with the song "Running Scared" written by Swedish songwriting team - Stefan Örn, Sandra Bjurman and Iain Farguhanson, backing singers - Lisa Stadell, Åsa Engman, Jessica Marberger and Vera Prada and man behind Azeri performance - Rennie Mirro (main person responsible for MF performances). It was fantastic and beautiful victory and we really hope to get to Eurovision in Baku next year as it's gonna be gorgeous by show, fun and low costs for everything.
Sweden came at respectable #3 with Eric Saade who performed "Popular" written by Fredrik Kempe, RedOne's written "Get You" performed by Alexey Vorobjov came #16 and Swedish-Finnish Paradise Oscar with self-written song "Da Da Dam" was #21.
I'm gonna tell you one interesting fact! Before Eric was chosen as the winner of MF-2011 and before Eldar was selected in Azerbaijan I was contacted by OGAE Azerbaijan who communicated with artists and helped them to choose songs and asked if instrumental version of Eric's "Manboy" was ever released - Eldar wanted to sing it in Azerbaijani final as he realy liked the song, it didn't happen as instrumental version of "Manboy" wasn't released but later Eldar could meet with Eric on the stage of Eurovision. Below you can watch Swedish Eurovision road of Azerbaijan to victory supported by Anders Bagge's label and sure Eric's performance of "Popular".

It's just a few days left before the first semifinal of Eurovision-2011 and like every year Sweden is massively involved in this music celebration not only with its own representative Eric Saade who will perform "Popular" on the stage of Dusseldorf's Esprit Arena.
Third year in a row Anders Bagge's label works with Azerbaijani artists and the song "Running Scared" that will be performed by duo Eldar and Nigar/Ell & Niki is written by Stefan Örn, Sandra Bjurman and Iain Farguhanson. Backing singers behind Eldar and Nigar are also Swedish - Lisa Stadell, Åsa Engman and the most exciting - Jessica Marberger and Vera Prada from Shirley Angels will be singing behind them. Also right hand of Christer Björkman - Rennie Mirro is working on the show.
Another team with the only native artist and Swedish all the rest represents Russia. This year RedOne who hasn't managed to win Melodifestivalen with Love Generation has turned his head to the East and has provided song "Get You" to Alexey Vorobjov (Alex Sparrow), they've written it together with AJ Junior, Bilal "The Chief" and Eic Sanicola. Talking about the rest of the team it will be schlager-veteran Britta Bergström (you could see her behind many Melodifestivalen artists and on Idol), Henrik Rongedal (yes, one of Rongedal brothers!) and dancers Robert Malmborg, Filmon Michael (danced this year with Jenny Silver) and Daniel Koivunen (danced with Linda Bengtzing in 2008). Show is directed by Saсha Jean-Baptiste (she worked on Love Generation's show and danced with Linda Sundblad). Ex-Idol jury member Peter Swartling is Alexey's manager and Kishti Tomita (also ex-Idol-jury) works as vocal coach.
Song that will represent Slovakia has also got Swedish touch. Swedish singer Sandra Nordstrom has written track "I'm Still Alive" together with Bryan Todd and Branislav Jancich, it will be performed by TWiiNS. Finland will be also presented by Swedish-Finnish Paradise Oscar (Axel Ehnström) with the song "Da Da Dam".
But back to Eric Saade, probably it's the first time Swedish performance can be called technically really complicated because of exploding glass box and organizers have got really big problems with this trick. After the first rehearsal when glass couldn't get exploded it was decided to make another extra-rehearsal when it finally has managed but still during second planned rehearsal in the first run it wasn't once again. There are not so much time to work everything out but still team has 3 general rehearsals starting on Wednesday to provide confident performance in semifinal on Thursday, below you can check how Eric's show has changed since March.

By the way remember I told you about brilliant mashups made by DJ King Rollo for some Melodifestivalen songs? He's back with new mashup of Eric's song and Britney's "Hold It Against Me" and it's lovely!

Breaking news today were delivered from Denmark where finalists of national Eurovision final were announced. As always we can find there some familiar Swedish songwriters names like Henrik Janson (responsible for Melodifestivalen-hits like "You're Out of My Life", "The Saviour", "The Queen") and Hanif Sabzevari ("Unstoppable") who have written song "You'll Get Me Through" for Sine Vig Kjærgaard. Thomas G:son, Erik Bernholm and Henrik Sethsson who composed "In a Moment Like This" last year this year participate with the song "25 Hours A Day" for disco-project Le Freak and Justin Hopkins with Patric Jonsson and Joakim Övrenius previously involved in Danish MGP and MF (Michael Michailoff "That's Love", Thomas Barsøe, "Just like rain") have also written "Black And Blue" for Kat and Justin Hopkins.
But really crazy news are that Jenny Berggren is wildcard of selection and what a great team of songwriters behind her!!! Thomas G:son who wrote the most successful entries of both Denmark (Chanée and N'evergreen "In A Moment Like This") and Sweden (Carola "Invinsible") for the latest 8 years (if we forget about Fame and Lena with the same results). But Thomas also gets help of Jeppe Federspiel (part of producing tema Providers) who delivered incredible hits for Medina lately ("Kun for mig", "Velkommen til Medina", "Ensom", etc.). Perfect combination to wait for national final on 26th of February! More information here.

Swedish participation wasn't so successful in Norway though. Last year Fredrik Kempe's song "My Heart Is Yours" has won MGP and this Jennifer Brown with Simone Larsen, Moh Denebi and Bjørn Djupström have written song "Gone with the wind" for soul-artist Noora Noor who hasn't reached final but still provided brilliant performance!

Maltese selection is also full of Swedish entries this year:
- Fabrizio Faniello - No Surrender (Johan Stentorp, Johan Bederholm)
- J.Anvil - Topsy Turvy (Jonas Gladnikoff, Niall Mooney, Andrew Zahra, Deo Grech, Natasha Turner)
- Kelly Schembri - Love Me Like Your Money (Erik Rydmark, Sven Lundholm, Gerard James Borg)

Our favorite here is clearly pop-rock schlager from Fabrizio.

Jonas Gladnikoff's song "Tensão" written with loads of his other friends (Daniel Nilsson (m), Henrik Szabo (m), Johnny Sanchez (m), Jonas Gladnikoff (m), Michael Eriksson (m), Filipa Ruas (l), Pedro Sá (l)) this year competes in Portugeese preselection performed by Filipa Ruas. Nice dance song

The biggest shock of 2nd semifinal of Eurovision-2010 for everyone was that Sweden won't participate in the final of Eurovision since 1977. Sweden didn't miss the final every year since semifinals-system was introduced in 2004 and this year it's the first time. By my personal observations Swedish media didn't blame Anna a lot, many star bloggers and newspapers showed compassion to her though sure there were a lot of evil remarks. Cruel irony is that we'll see all five songs written by Swedes for another countries qualified to the final + Iceland produced by Swede and Belarus with Swedish Robert Wells on the stage.
I need to say that I was as much shocked as I felt proud for Anna's performance, it was the first time for a long time when Melodifestivalen winner has made her best 100% and it looked incredibly powerful and magical. Unfortunately this year Melodifestivalen didn't have artist with a full pack (song+stable performance+interesting show) so Swedes have chosen talent and sincerity and I don't have any doubt it was the rightest choice. But as every year few brilliant songs are left not qualifying to the final here's no drama at all. Anna is the artist out of schlager-bubble and just like Martin Stenmarck who released his #1 album already in a year after his fiasko on Eurovision or Malena with her sold-out concerts last autumn Anna will be able to walk her own road to the top of charts so I don't worry about her.
We need to see advantages and the biggest one here can be that next year SVT will really try to make selection much better than this year and we'll have a lot of big names with amazing songs and fantastic show. And you know what? Doors of Melodifestivalen-2011 are already open!!! Songwriters can already send their song since tomorrow and rules of next year contest are already publiched. Some interesting moments that I've mentioned:
1) entries must be sent from 29 May through 21 September both to webjoker contest and main contest;
2) songs must be no longer than 3 minutes but no shorter than 2 minutes;
3) and the most interesting is that finally song can be written by foreign songwriters but at least one of authors must be Swede.
So heja Sverige! And let's prepare for a new season of Melodifestivalen that will start to give us some exciting news and actions already in September. And sure loads of luck to sweetest Anna Bergendahl and all Swedish songs in the final of Eurovision-2010.