Norway‘s Melodi Grand Prix is no fallen angel. In fact, it’s already set for its big return in 2022 and has opened submissions for next year’s contest. Songwriters have until August 15 to send in their tracks.
Following TIX — Norway’s man of the moment — will not be easy. To make it to Eurovision artists will once again endure a multi-week semi-final system. This year the show included five heats and a second chance round, which produced one of the strongest line-ups of the season.
The basics are clear: any participant can submit up to three songs; singers must turn 16 by April 2022; and the submission window is open until mid-August.
NRK also “recommends” that the submitted entries have at least one Norwegian composer, as they want to promote local music. Acts that follow the recommendation have performed well of late: their five most recent entries have been completely created and performed by Norwegian nationals.
Project manager Stig Karlsen says they’re “open to every kind of music” from sophisticated entries to hard rock to bubblegum pop. Considering their previous winners included heart-felt ballads, Euro-bangers and mid-tempo numbers, he’s not blowing hot air.
MGP 2022: What’s next?
Norway’s selection was one of the most celebrated of 2021. Fan favourites including Raylee, TIX and KEiiNO all took part. The contest ran from mid-January to mid-February and there were 26 entries, 12 of which made the final.
Karlsen described it as the “most important MGP ever”, given that it was taking place during a pandemic and at a time people felt separated from one another. Will next year’s edition be able to match this buzz of 2021?
No further details have been released so far. In 2020 and 2021, Norway went for a televote-only system. Whether that will be the case next year is still unknown.
Are you already excited for Norway’s MGP 2022? Who do you want to see in the show? Do you expect Ulrikke to come back and claim her place at Eurovision? Let us know in the comment section below!
Read more Norway Eurovision news here
Atle Pettersen or keinoo
I would like to see Maria Marzano or Natan Dagur!
Just to clearify – there are as many KEiiNO fans dissapointed in the fact that TIX won as there are TIX fans that try to tear down KEiiNO’s success and trashtalk them. People here seem to think its only the KEiiNO-fans that have put their “hate” on TIX but the TIX-fans are actually just as bad, especially when seeing comments in Norwegian medias. There is no denying that TiX won mostly because he is already the most popular mainstream artist in Norway, that is because of his name, and not his song. He has become extremely popular among people, after… Read more »
Fans should realise these shows aren’t made for them and thier needs to see another kitsch entry but for the local market and what Norwegians want to send. Those who say that TIX only won because of fan base and story and was a flop, seem to forget that he got 60 points from audience, which is more than other supposed fan favourites like Cyprus, Malta or San Marino. So clearly people liked the song enough to get him in top 15.
MGP was awesome this year, easily my favorite national final with San Remo.
For those saying they picked Tix because of his story and not the song and vocals: Fallen Angel did by far the best after semifinal one of MGP on Spotify. Why would they stream it if its that bad? Tix also got more televote points than some fan favourites (Cyprus, Malta), so people actually like the song.
Tix is popular for a variety of reasons- and that popularity influenced the streams as people want to support their faves.
I never ever thought I’d see KEiiNO fans calling for a return of the juries, but then I read through this comment section.
I hope Ulrikke will be back 😀
Hopefully Raylee won’t join MGP.
Ok but could we have a poll for the best live-on-tape for the semi-finalists?
This year Norwegian MGP was hands down THE best national final, with Melfest being not even close. Even several NQs would’ve looked adequate at the ESC semis (Circus, Smile, Pages). Although maybe 7 shows is a tad too much.
Norwegian and Scandinavian people in general mostly vote for what they believe to be cool and not necessarily for what they believe to be good. They should vote for they they like best, regardless of what is trending…
just not keiino cuz it might be the most overrated group to ever been in esc
THIS!!!!
Keiino won the televote in 2019, if someone was overrated that year it’s Duncan Lawrence
None of them. You all are just haters, who can’t accept how Europe love some acts you don’t
Actually this. Why are so many people unable to enjoy the songs they like without tearing down acts they don’t? Just let people who love Duncan / Keiino / anyone else their fun, its their music taste, not yours. Holy.
oh i def can accept it. just don’t agree with it.
Can we please get over the fact that it was Tix’s year and not Keiino’s? I hope that Keiino are not going to participate next year because I cannot stand another drama by their fans in case the don’t win.
No, we can’t! TIX’s win was again proof that national finals alone do not work. The public votes for its local hero, and not for the best possible act internationally. We also need a professional jury who takes international criteria into account. KEIINO would have had a far better result. Learn from this, learn!
And why do you think that Keiino could win with juries? We already know that they finished 18th with the juries in 2019. Also, why would we take international criteria into account when the artist is the one to represent the country itself and the people who live there. Those people decided that they want to see TIX representing them, not Keiino and we should all respect their decision.
Tix was chosen because he had a fanbase in Norway, not on the merit of his song or singing. That’s hardly fair – it’s like an act doing well in the televote because of neighbours and diaspora support.
You’re right to point out that in Rotterdam I can’t see Keiino winning over the juries, but since Monument was less kitsch than Spirit in the Sky, I’d think they’d slightly improve their standing with the juries.
Yeah but the hate that TIX got from Keiino’s fans was and is still HUGE. I think we are all aware that artists with huge fanbase in their countries always win no matter of the song. The same happened in my country in 2015 when Daniel Kajmakoski won our national selection because of his huge teen fanbase, not having in mind his song. He won over Tamara who probably had the best song (different tastes, but i think she had the best song). Also, if you don’t like the song doesn’t mean that there were no norwegians who liked the… Read more »
Monument wouldn’t have won, probably top 5 with the televoting was in their bag tho. I don’t think KEiiNO ever had in their mind winning as their only goal. A top 5 result overall would have been amazing and dederved. If Tix won beacuse of his singing or performer ability or because the song was the most liked by the public, it would be fine, but we all know he did win because ha has a big fanbase and like Azaad said, it’s not fair for other artists. It was the same in Italy with Ultimo in 2019, his song… Read more »
I’m pretty sure that KEiiNO being chosen by the ESC fan community had a lot to do with their fanbase going nuts as well.
Also, yeah, maybe Monument would have scored better than SitS with the juries (and probably only slightly), but it would probably wouldn’t have scored the televotes that SitS did, because a) It was a much stronger year than 2019, and b) Monument doesn’t really grab you from the get-go like SitS did.
Well, TIX didn’t win the televote so it’s another win for KEiiNO if I’m being frank
Monument would’ve finished Top 10, no question
It’s not just KEiiNO Vs Tix. Blåsemfian would have been a great choice for the contest. Or Imerika. Even Emmy was a more strategic choice than TIX. I agree that the entry has to be liked by locals first, but that should be because of the song, not because of the backstory of the artist. Also juries wouldn’t have hand KEiiNO 1st likely, but they would have put them over Tix, as Monument was more jury friendly than Spirit in The Sky, which ranked better than Fallen Angel at ESC.
Hopefully they choose a song that doesnt need a pr stunt to do well
I would like some returns to close the EPIC trilogy, for example Raylee or Rein Alexander and a return from KEiiNO would be epic..! Imerika will never do well in MGP because of the televote-only system
Not not Raylee, please. She has average songs, but gets away with it because of all the simps.
I agree and her vocals suck but at least she has become an icon with those generic songs
Controversial opinion: I hope Keiino won’t participate next year. I prefered Keiino over Tix as well but I got really annoyed about disappointed fans that kept bringing it up still months after MGP ended, get over it!
I don’t think they will ever come back to MGP. I feel like Monument was their peak and the one song to beat and they are wise enough to know it will be hard to overcome that one.
I agree with everyone we need the juries to come back. Don’t know why they elimininated them in the first place?
not Keiino nor Tix were the best imo. Imerika was the best.
I was really hoping they’d return to the pre 2020 format. Unfortunately they don’t have enough quality entries to justify such a large national selection. The choice of who gets to be an automatic qualifier can also feel arbitrary in a lot of cases (Akuvi in 2020 or Rein in 2021). Also getting rid of juries was a dumb move because you’ll another Tix act who might be genuinely popular in Norway and win on that basis rather than the quality of their song (see also Bilal in 2019 for France). Yes, Ulrikke and Attention would’ve done better had 2020… Read more »
akuvi was amazing tho
True, and it did guarantee at least one Norwegian language song in the final.
Maybe you meant Rein 😉
I didnt
I was joking of course, but I did not like Akuvi at all
Honestly, if Norway continuous to do MGP without jury votes, there is a chance (idk how high the chance is tho) that Norway will fade into a dark age (kinda what happened with The Netherlands in the 2005 – 2012 period).
I’m pretty sure the controversy with KEiiNO winning the televote whilst tanking with the juries had a lot to do with why they got rid of the juries in MGP.
Can we now say that Keiino would have definitely done better than Tix. Tix was the most borderline qualifier in SF1 (#10) and poor final result.
Agreed, but I don’t think they would’ve made top 10 of the final
No, we can’t. We don’t know what would have happened and we don’t need to know because it was Tix’s year and we already know how he finished. That’s enough, everything else is really unnecessary.
No we can’t.Because we don’t know and we won’t know. Just because they did well in 2019 doesn¨t mean they would have done better in 2021. In 2019 it might have been fun and fresh but in 2021 sending the same song again wouldn’t have been as exciting. Plus we know they wouldn’t do well with juries since they don’t like kitsch stuff with no musical quality in them..
YES!! Finally someone to say this out loud. Get ready for downvotes by Keiino’s fans who want to see Keiino every year for Norway.
When I made this comparison between Sennek and Hooverphonic before the semi final, predicting Hooverphonic about in 9th place in the semi (which they actually reached), you told me I was comparising appples and oranges or something like that. I don’t want to spread hate, but isn’t this double standards? Anyway, as much as I agree with you on the KEiiNO thing, it’s not respectful towards TIX to state over and over again KEiiNO would have scored better. Now the game are over. Stop with the KEiiNO vs TIX war. And this is also directed to anti KEiiNO fans, they’re… Read more »
I just hope for the following things in the final: -juries brought back (and thus 50-50 voting) -voting delivered in points, not just percentages (similar to Eurovision) -televoting calculated similar to that in 2011-2018 Melodifestival -juries’ results delivered in the form of points by spokespeople (a la Eurovision, also done by Melodifestival) -no duel system (should be something like twelve songs with only one session of voting) -no superfinal (making it similar to Eurovision and Melodifestival) -no automatic finalist (should be like Melodifestival where every entry has to fairly compete) -returning to a big venue (Trondheim Spektrum or Oslo Spektrum)… Read more »
so….you hope for the entire current system of melodi Grand Prix to entirely change
not entirely, tho. juries were there in 2018 and 2019. big venue? even 2020 had that before the pandemic stroke (and still strikes to this day but not as severe as it was).
I like Norwegians are really going full televote instead of jury bait. Going for what they like and feel.
Imagine The Bubble winning over Spirit in the sky in 2019 because juries…
2021, they had a fantastic Superfinal with all 4 acts being more televote than jury friendly. That’s why MGP is good and enjoyable.
full televote is okay, but let it be announced like how Melodifestival from 2011 to 2018 did it. and again, no superfinal/gold final/whatever-it-might-be-called.
But what’s the fun in that?
It’s also a recipe to flop with the juries at Eurovision.
I agree. Tix and/or Jorn would have never got the status of superfinalist with jurors voting. Blåsemafian and KEiiNO were guaranted superfinalists though.
They’re not going to bring back juries. Juries are reviled in Norway, largely thanks to KEiiNO winning the televote but tanking in the jury votes.