The Finnish broadcaster YLE has announced that their national selection Uuden Musikiin Kilpailu (or UMK for short) will be held on February 8th.
The live show will once again be held within the Nokia arena in Tampere, which can hold a total of 15,000 audience members. The executive producer Anssi Autio stated that the decision to keep UMK in Tampere was based on the heightened expectations around this year’s selection, Tampere’s success in hosting last year, and the success of an arena-based show in 2024.
In addition, the broadcaster announced that a total of 485 songs were submitted for consideration this year, continuing the surge of interest from songwriters and artists to represent Finland on the Eurovision stage.
Chair of the selection process Tapio Hakenen had the following to say about the selected entries:
“This season, UMK will see both a great continuation of Finnish pop tradition and a star of the future, waiting for their opportunity to shine bright. We will get to witness energetic band energy, hear German language in an UMK song, dance to the beat of an epic dance banger and be moved by one of the finest ballads in UMK’s history. The line-up is crowned by a song that makes you dance and cry at the same time.”
The finalists were determined by a professional and audience jury, and will be revealed on January 8th. The songs will then be released Monday through Friday starting at midnight on January 9th.
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