Sweden was again the last country to host the final of their national selection this year. Traditionally, Melodifestivalen was a grandiose event with five weeks full of prime-time broadcast semi-finals and a big final on the 14th of March in Globen Arena in front of thousands of people. The country was flooded by news from the event and the whole of Sweden was holding its breath to see who'll carry their torch this year.
Malena's way to Moscow started already last year when the author of last year's Swedish song Hero (by Charlotte Perrelli) and a long time friend of hers, Fredrik Kempe called and offered La Voix to her. "It sounded like a fun idea, but of course I thought about it for a long time. We recorded a demo during the autumn, and that was it!" she described.
Next she won a ticket to the final of Melodifestivalen from her semi-final in Malmö, surprising many, even herself. "I am so shocked. I still think that they have made a mistake," Ernman told Sveriges Television back then.
But the 38-year-old opera singer en dazzled the audience once again and even though the juries didn't particularly value her act, the televoters did and she got the maximum amount of points from them, rising her from the bottom of the list to the very top. One can ask why that happened but you can see the reason below!
Referring to Malena Ernman as Sweden’s most unusual opera star would hardly be an exaggeration. The mezzo-soprano from Sandviken - north Sweden - comfortably goes from the high culture opera houses of Vienna and Paris to comedy sketches at award shows without regard to the reactions from the sometimes-conservative world of opera.
Having her break-through performance in 1998, she's risen to stardom in the Scandinavian country and even in the other end of the world, giving concerts from Tokyo to Los Angeles, Paris to Rome.
Will she now conquer Moscow and all of Europe now as well? We'll see that if she takes the stage for the first time on the 12th of May, performing 5th in the first Semi-Final of this year's Eurovision Song Contest. If you want to know more about here, click here.
What do you think of her chances of getting qualified for the Final? Tell us below!
