The deadline for submitting songs to the Swedish Melodifestivalen has ended and the Swedish broadcaster SVT has informed that 1902 songs were submitted to the normal selection and 647 for the people’s selection, which is replacing the Web wildcard (Webbjoker) competition.

This is almost a 1000 fewer entries than last year, but according to the Melodifestivalen producer Christer Björkman it is  a sign that the songwriters and producers have started to be more critical in what they send in. The selection jury will have an easier job with the smaller amount, he says. In previous years the same songs have been returning year after year after being once rejected by the selection jury.

Now the selection jury will pick 15 songs from the ordinary entries and one song from the audience songs, that have to be from people without previous recording experience, like the Web wildcard has been in previous years. The remaining 16 songs will be specially invited by SVT (and not the jury), including one song (although not the winner) from the Svensktoppen nästa 2012 contest. Some of these 16 can also be from the ones sent to the ordinary submission. The names of the successful entries will be revealed at the end of October.

 The numbers of song submissions in previous years:

1995 – 981 entries
1996 – 1 475 entries
1997 – 1 223 entries
1998 – 1 121 entries
1999 – 1 315 entries
2000 – 1 394 entries
2001 – 1 567 entries
2002 – 1 831 entries
2003 – 2 630 entries
2004 – 3 228 entries
2005 – 3 131 entries
2006 – 3 326 entries
2007 – 3 234 entries
2008 – 3 489 entries
2009 – 3 440 entries
2010 – 2 860 entries (inc 246 web wildcards)
2011 – 3 832 entries (inc 424 web wildcards)
2012 – 3 485 entries (inc 570 web wildcards)
2013 – 2 549 entries

Source: SVT