With less than one and a half weeks left before the first semifinal of Melodifestivalen, Swedish broadcaster SVT has been shaken by a major crisis. SVT planned to let former Melodifestivalen participants perform as interval acts, but several artists have now cancelled their engagements.

Swedish broadcaster SVT has encountered a major problem in the preparations for Melodifestivalen. SVT had planned for a greater Melodifestivalen than ever before but as it looks now, it will be without any spectacular interval acts.

SVT had invited famous Swedish artists, former Melodifestivalen and Eurovision Song Contest participants such as Lena Philipsson, Charlotte Nilsson, Jan Johansson, Kikki Danielsson and many others. The plan was to create a gigantic jubilee cavalcade mixing different generations of artists in order to celebrate 50 years of Eurovision Song Contest. However, one by one the artists are now cancelling their engagements in protest, as they feel uncomfortable with the lack of planning and preparations at SVT.

Several persons from SVT have explained the situation to Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet and talked about the recent dramatic developments. “They just continue to bring up new ideas every day and don�t seem to have any control over the situation. They just have a week and a half left before the event and they still don�t know what they will have as interval acts” an anonymous person from SVT told Aftonbladet.

Charlotte Nilsson, winner of Eurovision Song Contes in 1999 says “if they want me to be in it, then they must come up with something very special.” Also last year's Swedish representative Lena Philipsson feels like “it is someone else�s turn to be in instead.”

At a press meeting two weeks ago a relaxed Thomas Hall, project manager of Melodifestivalen told esctoday.com that the preparations were going as planned. In Aftonbladet today, he denies that there are any problems and tells exactly the same. In the meantime, SVT's re-launched Melodifestivalen website, previously daily updated with news stories, has not been updated since Monday. Yet another sign that something might have happened at SVT.

Esctoday.com has contacted SVT and is awaiting more news from the Swedish broadcaster.