Tonight, the Norwegian national final for the 2009 Eurovision Song Contest was held. The televoters decided to send Alexander Rybak to Moscow with the song Fairytale, written by himself. He will be the 48th Norwegian entrant in the competition and the first male soloist since representing the country since 2003.

The national final was held on twoparts. In the first part the top four were chosen by televoting. These four songs were presented again in the secondpart and regional televoting and juries chose the eventual winner. The top four were:

1. Alexander Rybak – Fairytale (747888 votes)
2. Tone Damli Aaberge – Butterflies (121856 votes)
3. Alexander Stenerud – Find my girl (73380 votes)
4. Puliners – Te stein (62683 votes)

Alexander Rybak is a musician, composer and actor. He has taken to the stage with Arve Tellefsen and Morten Harket, amongst others. He won the Kjempesjansen show on NRK in 2006, and in 2007 he played in the Oslo Nye Teater and was awarded the Heddaprisen for his contribution. His song Fairytale reached #1 in the Norwegian single charts and it was the first MGP entry ever to reach the top of the charts before the final.

esctoday.com poll results

The esctoday.com poll voters agreed with the choice as Alexander Rybak was the runaway poll winner with 63.5%. Tone Damli Aaberge finished second in the national final and in the poll.

Maria Haukaas Storeng easily won the 2008 Melodi Grand Prix final getting almost 80,000 votes more than runner-up Torstein Sødal. With the song Hold on be strong, she finished 5th in the Eurovision Song Contest in Belgrade giving Norway its best placing since 2003. The song was a #1 hit in Norway and also entered the charts in Sweden and Denmark.

The semi final performance of Fairytale:

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