Robin Stjernberg wins Melodifestivalen Posted by Stephen Maconi on Apr 2, 2013 in Culture
By now this is relatively old news, but it is certainly still relevant! This year, Sweden will send Robin Stjernberg, winner of this year’s Melodifestivalen, to Malmö, a city in the very south of Sweden, with his song You to perform in the 2013 Eurovision Song Contest. For those of you who are unaware, the Eurovision Song Contest is a music contest that is held every year, to which most of the countries of Europe contribute one original song each. The winning country hosts the next year’s Eurovision Song Contest. In Sweden, Melodifestivalen is a domestic contest that occurs previous to Eurovision in which the people of Sweden vote for the artist who will represent their country in Eurovision.
While I did just say that the “people of Sweden” vote for the artist who will represent them in Eurovision, that’s not the whole story. Since 2009, a number of juries from other countries taking part in Eurovision have had 50% of the say in who should win Melodifestivalen. The other 50% consists of text message and telephone voting from within Sweden. When presenting the poll results, each country presents their number of points awarded to each song individually, and then the hosts of the contest present the Swedish votes. This year, the international jury gave Robin Stjernberg the most points and Yohio, another contestant, the fewest points. The Swedish people, however, gave Stjernberg second place and declared Yohio their winner. After all the votes were tallied, however, Stjernberg won the contest and Yohio got second place. Now, in May, Stjernberg will represent Sweden in the Eurovision Song Contest of 2013 in Malmö.
My question is this: Is it really fair that Stjernberg won over Yohio even though the Swedish people, whom the winner of the contest is to represent before the entirety of Europe, quite clearly wanted to see Yohio on stage in Malmö? Eurovision is, after all, an opportunity for every country involved to show a little piece of themselves the way their own people wish for them to be represented. What do you think? Feel free to comment!
In Stjernberg’s defense, however, his song is not at all bad and he was the second favorite of the Swedish people. Here is his performance:
And here is Yohio’s performance:
We look forward to reading your thoughts and ideas!
Build vocabulary, practice pronunciation, and more with Transparent Language Online. Available anytime, anywhere, on any device.
About the Author: Stephen Maconi
Stephen Maconi has been writing for the Transparent Swedish Blog since 2010. Wielding a Bachelor's Degree in Swedish and Nordic Linguistics from Uppsala University in Sweden, Stephen is an expert on Swedish language and culture.
Comments:
Penelope (Penny) D. Lightbourne:
…Yes…I totally agree on the judge’s decision to award Robin Stjernberg the honour of representing Sweden @ EuroVision 2013…for the following reason’s:..as the name implies: Euro’Vision’, is all about ‘vision’/what image to you wish to portray of your Country; well, Robin Stjernberg’s over all presentation is excellent beyond belief/the videography/choreography/is absolutely outstanding, with above exceptional lighting effects…the overall ‘vision’ is of dynamic presentation, yet not forceful, or strained, a totally relaxed energy, that conveys love in all it’s majesty/very tasteful/great costumes…& above all, the warm, authentic, engaging voice…this tremendous performer can communicate to all age’s in an audience…he has tremendous prescence, that is not offensive, and carries great contemporary style, without exaggeration…then as to Yohio’s presentation…again, who can doubt the spectacular pyrotechnics, etc.? …but, I find her to be stiff, too forceful, and she set’s up body language barriers with the audience, in other words, she would appeal to a much narrower band of appreciative listener’s…the lyric’s of her song, although sorrowful and descriptive, do not compare to the joyous uplifting lyric’s of Robin’s song…so, there you have my review/opinion…thanks to Sweden for their gifted youth…it’s a true blessing to the world…
LAPettersson:
First, I must say Yohio is a male as the previous poster continuously called him “she.” Robin Stjernberg performed well and has a good stage presence, however, the Melodifestivalen winner should be based on the “people of Sweden’s” vote in my honest opinion. Yes the goal is to win the Eurovision song contest but the purpose of the vote is for what the “people of Sweden” want, not what an outside jury wants. Yohio was clearly the people’s choice of Sweden, which is sad that non-Swedes had the deciding factor. Rules are rules and they were clearly changed in hopes that Sweden’s chance of a win would increase at the Eurovision song contest. Again,the policies behind the voting of Melodifestivalen now seems to be more concerned with winning at Eurovision than for what the people of Sweden chose to represent the country.
Second, I feel Yohio was the true winner of the contest. Was his performance stiff and unapproachable? No, that is his style, different and unique. Not like all the other performers who were basically the same or should I say “lagom?” I’d rather lose at Eurovision with the choice of my country, than win with what is just the same as everyone else, boring and uniform. But I suppose that would not be very “jantelagen.” Haha!
Robin will represent well, he is good, he is averagely normal and won’t stand out. Could have been worse than Yohio, it could have been Sean Banan winning, boy that wouldn’t be so “lagom” either. It’s just a TV contest, which doesn’t determine a country’s worth even though the voting seems to reflect that.
I wish Robin good luck and don’t have anything against him, he is just a performer and I’m sure he is happy to represent Sweden. I don’t think he will win like Loreen who like Yohio has a different, not typically Swedish style,and unique performance. Just my 2kronor on the matter 😉
efefwfwf:
YOHIO was our choice for Eurovision. Why even have a competition in Sweden if we dont get to choose who´s gonna represent us?
I do think the international juries are wrong and we will get an average finish in the final. Robin has a blank performance, i mean its not really a song you remember afer 26 songs unlike Denmark and Norway for an example.
YOHIO would have been an act everyone remembered afterwards. I know a lot of ppl disagree but lets just wait and see. I know i am right. Robin wont be higher than 15th 🙂
Lets hope we send something better next year ………………………… ……………………………………….. oh .. and get rid of those stupid jury groups!
Emma:
Robin winning was the right choice. He will come top 5 but Yohio would at best come top 15.