After a long waiting time the 10 acts that will battle it out for the chance to represent Denmark in neighbour country, Germany, in May was presented at a press conference today. It is a list of well known songwriters, an Ace of Base singer, an Irish boyband singer – and a change according to the rules.
DR, Danish broadcaster, received a total of 663 songs for their open selection. With the use of an internal jury seven of these have been chosen for the Danish final, the Dansk Melodi Grand Prix, that will be held on the 26th of February.
Those seven acts will compete against each other – and three specially invited participants making the line-up a total of 10 acts. They will try to convince the Danish population that they got what it takes to bring Denmark to the top of the Eurovision Song Contest scoreboard and improve Chanée and N’evergreen’s 4th position from Oslo with In A Moment Like This.
While months Danes will answer with a who? to most of the singers, the list of songwriters however reveal some familiar names to Eurovision Song Contest experts. The songwriters behind last year’s Danish winner; Erik Bernholm, Henrik Sethsson and Thomas G:son are back. For the latter, whose Eurovision entries are soon becoming uncountable, even with a double chance to win again. Lise Cabble, who wrote the Danish 1995 entry Fra Mols Til Skagen is also back for another attempt. Matilde Kühl, who participated as a singer in the 2010 edition, is one of this year’s songwriters and John Gordon, who wrote Satellite, which Lena went on to winning last year’s Eurovision Song Contest with, is ready to see if he can do the same for his home country Denmark.
Among the singers just one has been participating before; Kat who came third in last year’s Danish final with the song Come Come Run Away together with Silas. Jenny Berggren, member of Swedish pop group Ace of Base, is probably the most familiar name though. An Irish boyband member Lee Hutton will also be singing in the Danish final.
According to DR’s own rules for the Dansk Melodi Grand Prix the line up should have included four wildcards and six from the public submission. At the moment it is not known why DR decided to step away from that part of the rules – just as it is unclear why we have a Swedish songwriter among the wildcards intended for Danish top artists, who would otherwise not participate in the competition.
The participants are:
Lee Hutton – Hollywood Gir
Music/Lyrics: Matilde Kühl, Sune Haansbæk & Ian Mack
Denmark has been placed in the second of the two semi-finals at the 2011 Eurovision Song Contest where they will perform among the last half.
