Melodi Grand Prix 2018

Melodi Grand Prix 2018 was the 56th edition of Melodi Grand Prix, Norway's national selection for the Eurovision Song Contest. The competition was held on Saturday, 10 March 2018 in the Oslo Spektrum; which has hosted all the Norwegian finals since 2001.[1] The hosts were Kåre Magnus Bergh and Silya Nymoen, who also hosted the finals in 2015 and 2016, and the former also in 2017. Ten songs participated in the final, and like 2017, the winner was chosen by the viewers together with ten international jury groups. Alexander Rybak won the competition with his self-composed song "That's How You Write a Song".[2] Rybak also won both the Norwegian and international finals in 2009.[3] Rybak represented Norway in the Eurovision Song Contest 2018 in Portugal in May 2018. There, the song finished as number 15 in the final.[4]

Melodi Grand Prix 2018
Dates
Final10 March 2018
Host
VenueOslo Spektrum, Oslo
Host broadcasterNRK
Participants
Number of entries10
Vote
Winning song"That's How You Write a Song" by Alexander Rybak

Background

As in previous years, NRK invited Norwegian and foreign musicians to submit songs to the competition. This time, however, the invitation came in record time – already on 31 January 2017, a month and a half before the final of Melodi Grand Prix 2017. "transl. We are in the run-up to this year's MGP final, but we are working in parallel to find songs and artists for MGP 2018. This is a part of a long-term plan for Norway to win the Eurovision Song Contest again", said project manager Stig Karlsen. The submission deadline for contributions was 10 September 2017.[4]

When the deadline had expired, NRK had received close to 1,200 songs, which was a new record for the second year in a row.[5] The submitted songs were filtered down to around 100 and then assessed by a listening group of around 50 people. The ten finalists were presented during a press conference on 15 January 2018, and the songs were released in their entirety on the same day.[6]

Among the participants were former winners such as Alexander Rybak, Stella Mwangi and Aleksander Walmann. Otherwise, established artists such as Alejandro Fuentes, Nicoline Berg Kaasin and Ida Maria participated.[1]

Ahead of the final, however, the newcomer Rebecca and "Who We Are" were the clear favorites with betting companies and the Norwegian Grand Prix club.[7] In the seats behind were Alexander Rybak as well as Stella and Alexandra.[8] However, Vidar Villa's "Moren din" was the most played song by the participants on the streaming service Spotify. The day before the final, "Moren din" had been played over one million times, while runner-up "Scandilove" had just over 300,000 plays on Spotify.[9]

The shipment
Alexander Rybak, Stella Mwangi and Aleksander Walmann were among the participants.
Credit: Ernst Vikne and Mykola Swarnyk

As a prelude to the final, NRK produced several top-up programs online, radio and television. On NRK P1, the artists were presented two by two every Saturday in the program Snart MGP, and then daily during the final week on Nitimen. In addition, NRK1 had daily evening broadcasts from Oslo Spektrum. The broadcasts went live on NRK1 as part of the evening program Norge nå.[10] The final was broadcast live on NRK1 and NRK TV from 19:55 to 22:18. The broadcast was also broadcast on NRK P1 with Ole Christian Øen as commentator.[11]

The presenters were Kåre Magnus Bergh and Silya Nymoen.
Credit: Martin Fjellanger, EuroVisionary

During the broadcast, NRK visited a Grand Prix party in Trondheim.[12] In addition, the channel paid tribute to viewers and supporters of the competition, among other things, an enthusiastic fan was brought up on stage and paid tribute with a wreath and song. In the intermission number before the gold final, Karoline Krüger and Anita Skorgan performed with "For vår jord", which won the competition 30 years earlier. In the break before the gold duel, JOWST and Aleksander Walmann performed with last year's winning tune, "Grab the Moment". Also on stage were the Oslo bassoon choir and Didrik Solli-Tangen.[12]

Participants

The entries were announced on 15 January, while the starting order was announced on 2 March.[13]

First round
No. Title Artist Songwriters Status
1 "You Got Me" Stella and Alexandra Gustav Eurén, Niclas Arn, Stella Mwangi and Andreas Alfredsson Gold final
2 "Talk to the Hand" Aleksander Walmann Joakim With Steen, Jonas McDonnell and Magnus Klausen Gold final
3 "Scandilove" Ida Maria Ida Maria Børli Sivertsen and Stefan Törnby Out
4 "Light Me Up" Nicoline Nicoline Berg Kaasin, Johan Larsson and Emilie Adams Out
5 "I Like I Like I Like" Tom Hugo Tom Hugo Hermansen Out
6 "Stop the Music" Charla K Charla K, Per Gessle and Alex Shield Out
7 "Tengo Otra" Alejandro Fuentes Alejandro Fuentes, Angel Arce Pututi and Alejandro Pututi Out
8 "Moren din" Vidar Villa Vidar André Mohaugen, Jonas Thomassen and Martin Thomassen Out
9 "Who We Are" Rebecca Kjetil Mørland Gold final
10 "That's How You Write a Song" Alexander Rybak Alexander Rybak Gold final

Gold final and gold duel
No. Title Artist Songwriters Place
1 "You Got Me" Stella and Alexandra Gustav Eurén, Niclas Arn, Stella Mwangi and Andreas Alfredsson 3
2 "Talk to the Hand" Aleksander Walmann Joakim With Steen, Jonas McDonnell and Magnus Klausen 4
9 "Who We Are" Rebecca Kjetil Mørland 2
10 "That's How You Write a Song" Alexander Rybak Alexander Rybak 1

Voting

First round

In the first round, the international juries voted on the entries with points in denominations 1–8, 10 and 12. There were ten international juries with five members in each group.[14][15] In total, the ten juries awarded 580 points, and the television viewers had the same number of points to distribute. The viewers' points were distributed based on the percentage each song received. If a contribution received 10 percent of the SMS votes, this song received 10 percent of the viewers' 580 points - i.e. 58 points. The four songs with the most points advanced to the gold final. Only the jury's favorites were read out during the voting, the full result from the first round was not made public.[14]

No. Title  France  Russia  Czechia  Denmark  Bulgaria  Estonia  North Macedonia  Israel  Sweden  United Kingdom
1 "You Got Me"  France  United Kingdom
2 "Talk to the Hand"  Israel
3 "Scandilove"
4 "Light Me Up"
5 "I Like I Like I Like"
6 "Stop the Music"
7 "Tengo Otra"
8 "Moren din"
9 "Who We Are"  Denmark  Bulgaria  Sweden
10 "That's How You Write a Song"  Russia  Czechia  Estonia  North Macedonia
Spokespersons for the juries[16]

Gold final

In the gold final, only Norwegian viewers voted. After a short reprise of the songs, the four gold finalists were put into two pairs. The winners from each pair then met in a gold duel.[17] The gold duelists received the votes from the first part of the gold final.[18] The vote numbers in the gold final as well as the names of the international judges were published on nrk.no after the final.[14][16][18]

No. Title Artist Gold final Gold duel Place
1 "You Got Me" Stella and Alexandra 29,784 Not eligible 3
2 "Talk to the Hand" Aleksander Walmann 7,927 4
9 "Who We Are" Rebecca 46,260 123,504 2
10 "That's How You Write a Song" Alexander Rybak 133,164 306,393 1

Events

After two years, Jan Fredrik Karlsen chose to step down as musical director of Melodi Grand Prix, and instead project manager Stig Karlsen took over the job.[19][20] Stig Karlsen told NRK that the international juries would also be used in 2018. In addition, the Melodi Grand Prix editors used a reference group consisting of internal and external musicians, Eurovision fans and representatives from the public to select the ten final songs for the final.[21]

This year too, the editors opened registration for next year's final even before this year's final had been held. Registration for Melodi Grand Prix 2019 already opened on 31 January 2018 with a deadline of 9 September of the same year.[22] It would also turn out that two of the participants from 2018, Tom Hugo and Alexandra Rotan, would win Melodi Grand Prix 2019 as members of KEiiNO.

Reactions to the broadcast
Aleksander Walmann finished in fourth place.
Credit: Martin Fjellanger, EuroVisionary

In general, press, fans and the public were positive after the broadcast.[23] After the show, however, there were several media reports that NRK had put on "false cheering" in the broadcast, in order to better bring out the cheering and applause of the audience in Oslo Spektrum.[24] "transl. It is relatively common for television productions to compensate with the addition of content sound to compensate for sound that is difficult to capture in demanding environments", said project manager Stig Karlsen to the magazine Kampanje. Ethics advisor Gunnar Bodahl-Johansen at the Department of Journalism, on the other hand, was skeptical of the practice and believed it helped to weaken the broadcast's credibility.[25]

Several of the participants, including Vidar Villa's team, also believed that the international expert juries would favor English-language contributions over Norwegian.[26] NRK believed the fear was unfounded and responded by publishing the names of all 50 international jury members after the broadcast.[27] Dagsavisen journalist David Stenerud believed that NRK favored Alexander Rybak, among other things by giving him starting number 10 by the presenters several times asking the other artists about Rybak's singing and performance during the broadcast.[28] NRK denied that they had favored Rybak, and silver winner Rebecca emphasized that she did not feel run over or unfairly treated.[29]

The final was watched by 1,001,000 viewers, down around 150,000 viewers from the previous year. In the age group 10–29, the viewing share was 78 per cent.[30]

Reactions to the result
Rebecca came second with "Who We Are".

Alexander Rybak won the final with over 300,000 votes – around 2.5 times more than runner-up "Who We Are". This was Rybak's second win in the competition, and after the broadcast there were divided opinions about the winning entry. "transl. Some think we have a chance to win, while others are just looking forward to Alexander Rybak having to wipe his grin when Norway breaks into the semi-finals," said Morten Thomassen, head of the Norwegian Grand Prix Club, to NRK.[18][31] Aftenposten thought it was "transl. a gamble" to send Rybak to the Eurovision Song Contest in Lisbon.[32]

However, "That's How You Write a Song" went straight to the top of the Norwegian iTunes chart after the final – along with several of the other contestant songs.[33] The winning song also entered the top 10 of the most streamed songs on Spotify in Norway. Over the following week, however, the mainstream declined rapidly, and the winning song only had about half as many plays as the previous winning song "Grab the Moment". Rybak's winning song also only reached 28th place on the VG list before the international competition.[34]

Although the winning song did not become a major commercial success in Norway after the win, Norway's odds of winning the Eurovision Song Contest fell sharply. The week after the victory, Norway rose from 18th place and up to the top 10 among most international betting companies.[35][36] In the weeks before the Eurovision Song Contest, Norway was in seventh place among the biggest winning candidates.[37] At the same time before the 2017 competition, "Grab the Moment" was in 27th place.[38]

See also

References
  1. Hyttebakk, Jon Marius (15 January 2018). "Her er artistene i MGP 2018" [Here are the artists in MGP 2018]. NRK (in Norwegian). Archived from the original on 2018-04-07. Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  2. "Norway: Alexander Rybak is back – wins Melodi Grand Prix 2018". Eurovisionworld. 2018-03-10. Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  3. "Alexander Rybak". eurovision.tv. Retrieved 2023-07-04. Alexander Rybak became a household name across Europe after winning the Grand Final of the 2009 Eurovision Song Contest for Norway with the song Fairytale.
  4. Hyttebakk, Jon Marius (2017-01-31). "MGP 2018: Påmeldingen er i gang!" [MGP 2018: Registration is open!]. NRK (in Norwegian Bokmål). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  5. Hyttebakk, Jon Marius (2017-09-11). "Ny påmeldingsrekord i MGP" [New enrollment record in MGP]. NRK (in Norwegian Bokmål). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  6. Halleraker, Tormod (2017-12-13). "Deltok som «rabagast med korsett og pisk» i 2012. Leder neste års MGP" [Participated as a "rabagast with corset and whip" in 2012. Leader of next year's MGP]. Dagbladet (in Norwegian). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  7. Henriksen, Arve (2018-03-08). "Rebecca er den «ukjente» favoritten" [Rebecca is the "unknown" MGP favourite]. Aftenposten (in Norwegian Bokmål). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  8. "Odds Norway Melodi Grand Prix 2018". eurovisionworld.com. Archived from the original on 2018-03-09. Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  9. Owe, Thomas Alvarstein; Aune, Oddvin (2018-03-07). "Vidar Villa knuser odds-favoritten i Melodi Grand Prix" [Vidar Villa crushes the odds favorite in Melodi Grand Prix]. NRK (in Norwegian Bokmål). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  10. Sand, Camilla (2018-03-02). "Følg oppladningen til MGP på NRK" [Follow the charging of MGP on NRK]. NRK (in Norwegian Bokmål). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  11. "MGP helaften - Melodi Grand Prix - radio". NRK Radio (in Norwegian). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  12. Melodi Grand Prix 2018 (in Norwegian Bokmål), 2018-03-10, retrieved 2023-07-04
  13. Hyttebakk, Jon Marius (2 March 2018). "Her er låtrekkefølgen i årets MGP". nrk.no (in Norwegian Bokmål).
  14. Tangen, Anders Martinius. "Femti personer i den internasjonale juryen i MGP - escNorge" [Fifty people on the international jury in MGP - escNorge] (in Norwegian Bokmål).
  15. Sand, Camilla (16 February 2018). "Melodi Grand Prix 2018". NRK.no (in Norwegian Bokmål).
  16. Hyttebakk, Jon Marius (11 March 2018). "Medlemmene i den internasjonale juryen" [The members of the international jury]. NRK (in Norwegian Bokmål).
  17. Tangen, Anders Martinius. "Gullfinalen blir til Gullduell i MGP - escNorge" (in Norwegian Bokmål).
  18. Hyttebakk, Jon Marius (12 March 2018). "Fikk mer enn dobbelt så mange stemmer som Rebecca". nrk.no (in Norwegian Bokmål).
  19. Ighanian, Catherine Gonsholt (19 May 2017). "Jan Fredrik slutter som MGP-general" [Jan Fredrik quits as MGP general]. Verdens Gang (in Norwegian). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  20. "Karlsen gir seg som MGP-general" [Karlsen resigns as MGP general]. Dagbladet (in Norwegian). 2017-05-19.
  21. Hyttebakk, Jon Marius (19 May 2017). "Karlsen gir seg som MGP-general" [Karlsen resigns as MGP general]. NRK (in Norwegian). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  22. Hyttebakk, Jon Marius (31 January 2018). "Nå kan du sende inn låt til MGP 2019" [You can now submit a song for MGP 2019]. nrk.no (in Norwegian Bokmål). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  23. Aronsen, Anniken; Bøe, Tor Martin; Østbø, Stein (10 March 2018). "VG anmelder Melodi Grand Prix – låt for låt" [VG reviews Melodi Grand Prix - song by song]. Verdens Gang (in Norwegian). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  24. Lilleås, Heidi Schei (12 March 2018). "NRK satte på falsk jubel under Melodi Grand Prix" [NRK put on fake cheers during the Melodi Grand Prix]. Nettavisen (in Norwegian). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  25. Jerijervi, Dag Robert. "Slik «lurte» NRK tv-seerne - satte på falsk jubel under Melodi Grand Prix" (in Norwegian).
  26. Braseth, Sofie (2018-03-09). "Frykter internasjonal MGP-jury diskriminerer norske låter" [Fears the international MGP jury discriminates against Norwegian songs]. Dagbladet (in Norwegian).
  27. Braseth, Sofie (2018-03-09). "Reagerer på hemmelig MGP-jury: - Hvem er disse menneskene?". Dagbladet (in Norwegian). Retrieved 2023-07-02.
  28. Stenerud, David (11 March 2018). "Her setter NRK siste spiker i MGP-kista til Rebecca (19) - Nye Meninger". Dagsavisen. Retrieved 2018-03-13.
  29. Grindem, Karianne (2018-03-13). "NRK slår tilbake mot kritikken:-Dette er en svært drøy påstand". Dagbladet (in Norwegian). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  30. Aune, Oddvin (13 March 2018). "Milliontall da Rybak vant MGP" [Millions when Rybak won the MGP]. NRK (in Norwegian Bokmål). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  31. Hyttebakk, Jon Marius (11 March 2018). "Delte meninger om Rybaks vinnerbidrag" [Divided opinions about Rybak's winning entry]. NRK (in Norwegian Bokmål). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  32. Gjestad, Robert Hoftun (10 March 2018). "Kommentar: «Sjansespill å sende Rybak til Eurovision»". Aftenposten (in Norwegian Bokmål).
  33. "Norway iTunes Top 100 Songs | Hot Music Charts". www.hotmusiccharts.com. 2018-03-11. Archived from the original on 11 March 2018. Retrieved 2018-03-13.
  34. Talseth, Thomas (16 March 2018). "Lytterne svikter Alexander Rybak". Verdens Gang (in Norwegian). Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  35. "Norway: Alexander Rybak's odds of winning Eurovision narrow...as MGP reveals lopsided televoting results | wiwibloggs". wiwibloggs. 2018-03-13. Retrieved 2023-07-04.
  36. "Norway: "That How You Write a Song" Enters Top Ten in Betting Odds - Eurovoix". Eurovoix. 2018-03-12. Retrieved 2023-07-04.
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  38. "Odds Eurovision Song Contest 2017". Eurovisionworld. Retrieved 2023-07-04.
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