Since 2012, the Swedish radio song competition P4 Nästa has included a wildcard entry to Melodifestivalen for one of its lucky finalists. However, Swedish broadcaster SVT has now confirmed that the Melfest wildcard has been “paused” for the upcoming P4 Nästa 2021.
The news was broken by Swedish blog ESC Panelen. They discovered that the entry rules for P4 Nästa 2021 did not include any information about a Melodifestivalen wildcard.
ESC Panelen then reached out to P4 Nästa project manager Maths Broborg who confirmed that Sveriges Television and Sveriges Radio have chosen to “pause” the wildcard, at least for the P4 Nästa 2021 / Melodifestivalen 2022 season.
P4 Nästa artists are still able to be considered for Melodifestivalen, but they will need to enter along with everyone else as part of the usual open submission period.
The P4 Nästa ticket to Melodifestivalen
Since 2012, P4 Nästa had given one act a place in the semi-finals of Melodifestivalen. The ticket originally went to the overall Nästa winner, but since 2015 it was been decided separately by the competition jury.
As the competing songs of P4 Nästa are not eligible for Melodifestivalen, acts have been required to select a brand new song as their Melfest entry.
Nästa acts have not typically done well in competition at Melodifestivalen.
The Nästa acts with the best results at Melfest were Terese Fredenwall with “Breaking the Silence” in 2012 and Smilo with “Weight of the World” in 2015. Both acts each placed fifth in their respective semi-final, and both narrowly missed out on the andra chansen round.
Most recently, Julia Alfrida placed last in her semi-final at Melfest 2021 with her song “Rich”. To date, no Nästa act has made it all the way to the Melfest grand final.
Meanwhile, P4 Nästa 2021 is in the middle of its regional selections. Throughout May and June, 25 region P4 radio stations will hold their local finals. From there, a number of regional winners will be shortlisted for the P4 Nästa grand final, due to be held on 3 September in Västerås.
What do you think? Are you sad that P4 Nästa wildcard has been paused? Or is it the right decision? Tell us your thoughts below!
unlikely, but i will be ECSTATIC if dotter returns
She can’t for 2022. You can’t do MelFest three times consecutively, you have to take a year out. That’s why we didn’t see Anna or Hanna in 2021, because they did it in 2019 and 2020.
Oooh, Anna and Hanna gave me Eva&Ewa vibes
This is probably for the best. No PA winner ever been able to make it out of the semi finals at melfest.
I hope Melfest will make some general changes….
Melfest seems to be a very big cash machine for the recording industry in Sweden. Even if Tusse was left on the right side of the Eurovision scoreboard, I don’t think Melfest will change its formula…
This is a good point Vlad19 – why change the concept and songs to please the viewers of ESC when Mello is so much more than just a selection for the ESC? There are also generally more Swedes watching Melodifestivalen than there are watching Eurovision. Almost how Sanremo is in Italy, Mello is in Sweden. If Eurovision was to be completely cancelled, would Mello also be cancelled? Wouldn’t think so.
I am surprised they didn’t ditch it sooner. They don’t even get played on P4, the channel they originate from!
clara klingentröm must come back to melfest next year! she is just brilliant. her success this year will be replicated and maybe even improved on by her or someone else in the years to come— hopefully with a song in SWEDISH
It’s intersting that if you check the Sverigetopplistan in recent weeks, you only find Tusse’s and Clara’s songs.
Her song just got certified platinum.
Next year we need more clara and less klara
Forget about the silly season
Fun fact: Clara made the final of the 2012 P4 Nästa that Terese won. I’m pretty sure she’s the only P4 Nästa alumni to reach the Mello final, but if I’m wrong, correct me.
I guess they saw that each Nästa winner saw his hopes and dreams crash when they placed 6th or 7th, so it was just a waste of time
Unrelated but Mitch Tambo (from Eurovision Australia decides 2019) is on QandA which is a huge current affairs panel show and he’s saying a lot of important things regarding the plight of indigenous Australians today.
After seeing this year results I don’t think any of this year melodifestivalen acts would have score that high. They need to get fresh and unique songs.
I think all the other acts in the top 4 would’ve scored better than Tusse. Eric: His song was extremely radio friendly and the staging would’ve helped it stand out, and Eric would’ve had more televote support by virtue of his ESC past. However, he may have lost some jury points due to subpar vocals. Overall better. The Mamas: Stronger vocals but a not so strong song, and probably worse staging. On balance they probably would’ve done a bit better since they’d likely get more fan support. Dotter: If she changed the staging from Melfest I see this making the… Read more »
Highly disagree. Tusse ranked 7th with a song that to many first listeners is more appealing than In the Middle and Little Tot. The Mamas: Fans vote count zero. Most people just pick up their phones on the night and vote for what stands out the most. Juries in Melodifestivalen are somewhat indicative of an eventual outcome with juries in the contest as the past showed us several times. Well, The Mamas were kinda low with juries (6th in a weak competition if I remember correctly) so they could have been borderline qualifiers with the juries and qualification was in… Read more »
If that means they want to include more diverse acts i am here for it. The days of melfest fast food overstaged entries are over, hopefully they realize that.
As a Swede, yes I agree