Eurovision may be in off-season but it doesn’t rest here at ESC Insight. Once a fortnight from now until Christmas Ben Robertson publishes the ESC Insight Newsletter which is designed to give you the latest news from everything about Eurovision.
In our latest edition we look at which cities are the favourites to host the contest in Austria, what some of our Eurovision stars are up to post-contest, and a look ahead at some of the selections for Junior Eurovision coming up. We also feature the regular ‘Robertson’s Reflection’ where Ben shares his opinion on the latest happenings in the Eurovision world.
This week he explains why he believes SVT’s new quota on female songwriters in Melodifestivalen is a step too far. An excerpt is re-published below:
“Remembering that the process, especially of the pre-Melodifestivalen jury, is one without access to the information of which songs were written by which songwriters, means that there should not be any bias for or against songwriters based on their gender. What is likely more than anything is that SVT want to encourage more female songwriters to take part (the numbers are not released for this, but it would be expected that less than half of the songs submitted would be written by females).
I don’t believe that any member of the Swedish public or selection process is at any point favouring voting for certain songs based on the gender of the composer. Indeed Joy and Linnea Deb have had great success with a 1st and 2nd place in the last two years (News of a UK release for ‘Busy Doin’ Nothin’ may just come in time to be a summer hit there too). Sharon Vaughn, who helped co-write ‘Waterline’ for Jedward had two songs in the final this past year. Female songwriters do have a fair opportunity to do well in Melodifestivalen.”
If you want to read Ben’s full argument and the rest of the newsletter it is only one click away. You can also find our entire back catalogue of newsletter’s in our archive, and if you really love the newsletter consider joining up to the email list to get them delivered direct to your inbox.