lensart

När jag vår ung, trodde jag på det. Men, nu är jag gammalt och jag vet det är inte sant.

It might be more interesting to have the first few lines of a new posting instead of the poster's username. The username really isn't valuable information when looking at the overview of posts. It is more interesting to see what the last person who posted said, than who posted last. That way one could scan the debate in a particular thread for interest simply from the first line of a new post.

Christer, Thank you once again for responding to my yearly email concerning the Melody Festival rules. I appreciate you taking time to once again do so. This year I have begun a debate in the Studio Magazine forum and invite you to participate. The concern that I’m voicing is not based upon the relationship of SVT to SMFF, but that the Melody Festival rule set, which is written by SVT, assigns SMFF the task of judging the initial entries, even though members of that organization have a monetary interest in the ultimate success of competition songs, since they act as agents for some of the contestants. It seems like leaving the fox to guard the hen house, doesn’t it? Shouldn’t some other organization that has less conflict of interest be the initial song filter? It doesn’t seem like a coincidence that a grossly disproportionate number of ‘approved’ songs come from members of SMFF. In my opinion it is unethical to ask the public to spend time recording songs for the contest, when the chance that they have to be chosen is much less than song writers who have a publisher in SMFF. It is misleading for SVT to state that there were 3000 entries, when 2900 of them were very possibly summarily dismissed by the SMFF. I invite you to participate in the debate going on in the Studio magazine forum at https://www.studio.se/index.php?showtopic=26913. This letter will, of course, be posted there. Given that a large number of amateur and semi-professional song writers can be found there, it might be very constructive for you to read their views. Given the current rule set, it appears that the true purpose of the song contest is to promote the music of the Swedish Music Publisher’s Union, in which case I think that ‘melody festival’ is an inappropriate name and ‘SMFF Promotion Festival’ should replace it. Sincerely, Kirk Clendinning

Ordet Melodi kan väl även betyda Låt? Så jag förstår inte varför man ska utesluta arrangemang. Många melodier skulle inte låta särskilt övertygande utan ackord. Så för mig så är arrangemanget även en del av låtskrivarprocessen, eller vad är det ja missar? 😕 Dock håller jag med om att man ska lägga tyngdpunkt på själva låten i första hand. Sedan om det är en bra show är det ett plus. Som sagts tidigare kan Carola lyfta en inte särskilt övertygande melodi, men förstå då kombinationen av detta MEN med en övertygande melodi. Med närmare tanke ang. MIDI filer. En ev sång gör ett annat sound av melodin, med tanke på de olika vokalerna bl a. Och produktioner (inspelat/programmerat material) i allmänhet hjälper till att "få fram" kompositionen, med hjälp av dynamik, glide to note, etc. Så jag tycker allting går hand i hand, mer eller mindre. Men om detta skapar de problem du pratat om, så kanske man ändå måste använda sig av MIDI filer... Jag blir osäker. Viktigare är väl att man har en helt oberoende jury som väljer låtarna, inte de vanliga snubbarna. Yeah, I agree. The idea that certain melodies wouldn't sound good without the arrangement is true. And, my response to that is, they are not strong melodies! What has been lost now in pop music, with the advent of computerized arrangement technique, is similar to what has happened in film with digital effects; the plot is lost in the explosions. For me, there is a place for effect driven music, however that isn't in a melody festival. My opinion is that the melody and text should stand on their own without the backing arrangement. Then when the arrangement is added, the song is even stronger. So I guess the first question is whether or not the contest should be a 'song' contest or a 'Melody Festival'. I prefer the latter. I'm one who believes that both an effect driven song and melody driven song are art forms in their own right, but the former is an example of artistic ability 'playing' the studio, while the latter is an example of song crafting. For me the melody festival should be a contest of song crafting, not a display of production ability.

I must admit, I'm don't read or write music well. However, there are plenty of scripting tools available on computer now, among them 'Harmony' from a group in France, that inexpensively allows those that 'play by ear' to write a lead sheet. Frankly, a lead sheet is simply the melody line. It is a single staff with one line of notes and the words under it. It is what used to be required for a copyright before tapes were allowed.

Essentially, one would send an entry that contains what is required to copyright a song, melody and text with optional chords. To me, any arrangement helps give away the identity of the songwriter(s). I admit, it's almost impossible to completely separate the artist from the melody, but as you said, this would be a good compromise. What is more troubling, is that no one in Swedish Television or the musicians union... or perhaps the correct translation is the music publisher's union, see anything unethical about what is being done. It makes one question the very nature of humanity... are we still ruled by the 'selfish gene?'

Okay.. I couldn't help myself. I wrote Martin and asked him to participate in our little discussion. Martin, Again this year I’ve brought up a discussion of the Music Festival rules, only this time I have done so with musicians instead of SVT. Perhaps you’d be interested in taking part in this discussion. You can find it at https://www.studio.se/index.php?showtopic=26913. The question posed is why the 2007 rules state that those affiliated with SVT can’t compete, yet there is no mention of Svenska Musikförläggarföreningen judging the initial entries, yet also being the home of the majority of winners. Isn’t this a classic conflict of interest? Perhaps it’s time to either change the name of the contest to Swedish Music Industry Song Contest for Eurovision Promotional Exposure, or change the rules. Sincerely, Kirk Clendinning

Svenska Musikförläggarföreningen Föreningsjurist Ellinor Gyllenstierna Telefon: 08-783 89 86 E-mail: ellinor.gyllenstierna@smff.se Ordförande Kjell-Åke Hamrén Telefon: 08-783 95 24 E-mail: kjell-ake.hamren@@smff.se Ellinor, How come the members of the music union judge the entries to the song contest when so many of the member are competing. As a legal professional, I’d think you would understand how much of a conflict in interest that is. Don’t you think the melody festival rules should be changed so that members of the musician’s union are not allowed to compete if members of the union are judging the contest? Care to comment on the discussion I’ve started at Studio magazine’s forum? https://www.studio.se/index.php?showtopic=26913 Kirk PS, this letter in included in the discussion…

What would be really impressive is if I could write in Swedish... I can read it but not write it alas... English is my native language. As I explained in an earlier post, Does that mean an immigrant shouldn't express himself in Sweden if he cannot do so in Swedish? 😠

Now for the rules for those who are interested. At the Eurovision site is says: That means SVT and TV4. WHAT? TV4 could put on their own song contest? Looks like it... As for the local rules: What does transparency mean? The Swedish rules may found at: http://svt.se/content/1/c6/59/43/81/t%E4vl...regler_2007.pdf Here are a few of the interesting parts: Yeah, like they won't be able to hear who's singing the demo.. what a joke! But yet... I think that anyone associated with Svenska Musikförläggarföreningen should be disqualified for competion as well... Oh.. then there wouldn't be any contestants... Anyone interested in a rule change should write: m Martin Österdahl, projektledare SVT Fiktion, 08-784 0000 eller mejl martin.osterdahl@svt.se

SVT is a bit sensitive about this very question. Here's what it says on their homepage. But their math is a bit confused, the question asks about established songwriters, their answer talks about the number of writers who weren't involved earlier (a bit under what I counted in previous years). That answer is misleading because it doesn't count established songwriters working in a team with old pros... Not much encouragement to amateurs without industry connections. And if you count the Thomas G:son types who are involved with more than one song, that number looks more like 32 out of 89. Each time Thomas G:son was involved in a song, he should be counted as a participant. The real question, of course, is how many songs are written only by amateurs. I think this year that number would be... hmm... let me see if I added this up right... ZERO!!!! I might have counted wrong, so here's the list of all the song writing participants. Andreas Johnson, Peter Kvint, Calle Kindbom, Dan Fernström, Ingela "Pling" Forsman, Lars "Dille" Diedricson, Martin Hedström, Robert Olausson, Matti Alfonzetti, Johan Lyander, Sonya, Anders Glenmark, Niklas Strömstedt, Michael Clauss, Matthews Green, Carola Häggkvist, Thomas G:son, Bobby Ljunggren, Henrik Wikström, Lina Eriksson, Mårten Eriksson, Thomas G:son, Calle Kindbom, Alexander Bard, Anders Hansson, Lars Åberg, Jan Schaffer, Niclas Molinder, Joacim Persson, Pelle Ankarberg, Ingela "Pling" Forsman, Bobby Ljunggren, Henrik Wikström, Mikael Anderfjärd, Andreas Nordqvist, Dan Attlerud, Patrik Isaksson, Thomas G:son, Marcos Ubeda, Simone Moreno, Anders von Hofsten, Andreas Unge, Andreas Kleerup, Anna Sahlin, Bobby Ljunggren, Henrik Wikström, Kristofer Stange, Adam Chiapponi, Stefan Wesström, Martin Landh, Joacim Dubbleman, Sam McCarthy, Daniel Bäckström, Eddie Brown, Jens Duvsjö, Martin Carboo, Dan Larsson, Ingela "Pling" Forsman, Bobby Ljunggren, Henrik Wikström, Thomas G:son, Patrik Magnusson, Johan Ramström, Pablo Cepeda, Thomas G:son, Pontus Assarsson, Magnus Rongedal, Henrik Rongedal, Lotta Ahlin, Tommy Lydell, Niklas Edberger, Johan Fransson, Tobias Lundgren, Tim Larsson, Thomas G:son, Henrik Sethsson, Henrik Hansson, Anders Hallbäck, Mats Söderlund, Anderz Wrethov, Johan Fransson, Tobias Lundgren, Niklas Edberger, Tim Larsson, Sandra Dahlberg, Evan, Malin Eriksson, Jonas Sjöström

So the next question, or course, is how the Eurovision contest is run... What are the rules by which countries must abide to participate? How is the official 'host' of a country's contest chosen?

I think that it is important to separate production, performers and arrangement from the melody if one is to call it a 'Melodifestivalen'. As well, hearing an arrangement or a singer's voice is a very strong clue as to who sent in an entry.

Yes and I'm not steered by my wife either... 😉 While the two are not directly coupled, one might say that they get up on different sides of the same bed every morning. If you see laws that are not in favor of SVT get passed (or laws that make it easier to have private TV and radio) then you'll see more criticism of the government on the air. If you see too much critique of the government, then you'll see laws that support 'state' media and SVT funding under attack. It's not a perfect marriage, but it works. In fact, industry... one might think of as the child of the family still sleeps with his parents when he has bad dreams... 😳

The point of the boycott is that SVT does make a big deal about asking everyone to send in a song. I've got nothing against the music industry having a song contest to send to Eurovision if they want to do that, as long as everyone is playing on the same page, so to speak, and everyone knows what their TV license is paying for. What I want to see stopped is this senseless Santa Claus lie that SVT tells every year to young hopeful songwriters. I think that is unethical and irresponsible. OR... I want to see them adopt a rule change that only allows lead sheets to be sent in. That would make it more difficult (though not impossible) for the industry to cut to the front of the line. OR... I want the name changed to 'Best Produced Demo with the most Star Studded Cast Contest'... 😳

That's true, but interestingly, it is the total number that suffers. The music industry always enters about 100 or so songs. But, their songs have ten time the chance of being selected. After a few years of 'We had over 100 songs to choose fromt this year...' I think things might change. What's the use of 1000s of musicians sending in songs that have no chance of being chosen, just so SVT can make the contest sound bigger than it is? In this case, the best way of bringing about a change is to NOT make your music heard...

I live in Sweden and understand Swedish... but I write like a 6 year old when I try to express myself in Swedish. So, when I participate in forums like this, I read the Swedish but reply in English. I got started on the Boycott the Melodifestivalen a couple years ago after looking into the statistics of the contest. There is a huge skewing of the numbers indicating that the way it is run is not correct. I realized that SVT was doing Swedish musicians a huge dis-service by making them think that they could accomplish something by spending hours and hours to do a demo and send it into the contest. In reality, SVT gets literally thousands of people to donate their time so that SVT can say 'There were over XXXX entries this year.' to make the contest sound really big among musicians, which gives the impression to the Swedish people that the best musicians and melodies are available each year. NOT TRUE! One would think that a government run television service would be less prone to self supporting propaganda... but sadly no. So, I'm asking musicians to talk to each other and save themselve a lot of time and trouble by not participating in the contest until such a time that lead sheets are used instead of demo tapes that let SVT know which famous musician is involved with the writers... 😄

A quiet revolution... If one musician convinces another not to enter, who convinces another... how hard can it be to NOT send in an almost worthless entry. The point is to communicate with one another. The amateur musical community is not that large. Maybe next year the quiet revolution will have succeeded. It will be easy to tell. When SVT sees a drop in the number of entries

It is such a shame for Swedish musicians. It could be a great way for new talent to be found. Instead it is a classic big business runs over the little guy way of ramming the same old sh*t down the throat of the public. Quick frankly, I'm glad to have seen the monster band win this year... got to admit, here's one 50 year old who voted for them. hee hee.

Take a stand! Musicians write music because they have something to say...

Did you know that if you go back almost 35 years and look at the songwriters whose songs were chosen to be included in the Swedish melody festival, that almost 80% of them have participated in a previous contest? And, more than half of the new songwriters each year (the other 20%...) have music industry contacts. That means almost no amateur has a chance of getting their song into the contest. Take a look at Melodifestivalen on Wikipedia or Susning.nu and follow the song writer links. If thousands of songs are sent every year, how is it that the same people are chosen year after year, some of them more than once in a single year? Are they just such great songwriters that their melodies are far and above all the rest? Probably not. However, given that they have access to all of the great performers, producers and recording studios in Sweden, I'd imagine that their entries sound much better than all of the rest. For instance, if Carola sings on your song entry, what do you think the chances of it getting chosen are? And that's the point. If the Swedish Melody Festival is to be what it name suggests, then why aren't melodies more important? Why aren't entries simple lead sheets with music, words and chords on them? If that were the case, people with multi-million kronor studios and access to recognizable voices wouldn't have a huge advantage over the thousands of amateurs who enter the contest. The contest wouldn't be a TV license paid Swedish music industry promotion and party every year. It would be a contest of Swedish song writers. No one is saying that the performers shouldn't be well know so that the public wants to see the show. Let's not get that side discussion started. The performers should be hand picked by SVT just like they are now... but not the song writers... It's the melodies that should be judged. SVT claims that using lead sheets would take more time than listening to demos. Any musician knows that a good sight reader sitting at a keyboard can pick up a leadsheet and begin playing and singing faster than a CD can be put into a CD-player and index the first tune. The bottom line is that SVT wants to know which famous stars have entered by hearing their voices on the entry songs. It is time that amateur Swedish musicians let the rest of Sweden know the the music festival should change its name to the Swedish Music Industry Annual Song Promotion by boycotting the contest. It would be better if Studio magazine held its own contest, using lead sheets, rather than demo CDs and billed it as the true Melody Festival. In the coming years SVT should have to say, 'There were 45 entries this year by the music industry, no amateurs wasted their time...' Boycott the Swedish Music Festival and let the media know that you are doing it and why. Until leadsheets, that hide the identity of the songwriter, are used, the contest will continue to be an industry promotion paid for by the Swedish people through their TV licenses.

A bass roll-off filter is present on many microphones to counteract something called 'proximity effect'. Without going into the physics of sound in air and transducers, accept that the frequency response of a directional microphone is somewhat distance dependent. At short distances from sound source to microphone a low frequency boost occurs. If one wants a 'flat' microphone response, then the bass roll-off can be used to compensate.

I used to work for one of the music stores on the list during the time period in which the original question was posed. As for me, the thing that disappoints me most about all of the music stores is their lack of expertise. I don't know how many times I've heard it, 'Buy from our local music store because we provide support and expertise. The big post order and web shops don't.' Support and expertise my *ss! I've never been to a music store that gave anything but lip service to expertise and support as a last resort. Okay, if something goes wrong, they'll poke about a bit, scratch their heads and send it to a service center if you really ask nicely. But, real electronics, sound or computer know-how? I DON'T THINK SO. Why don't music stores hire an actual degreed electronics engineer or programmer who are interested in music, but who have actually designed and built something, to help with customers, instead of a bunch of hobby hacker musicians that have just enough math to run the cash register? Most staff in a music store don't know an Ohm from a hole in the ground and if they think they know, watch out! Nothing is worse than a pseudo-tech with just enough knowledge to be dangerous. I think that music chains like Musikbörsen and Jam, and large stores like Andreassons (who have changed their name to the 4Sound logo they got other music stores in the area to help them promote) need to hire Chief Technology Officers for their companies so that they develop expertise in something other than fooling the customer. I can not count the number of sound installations that I went to service calls on and found basic installation problems that resulted from a poorly educated technician in too deep and way over his head. Music store staff need to learn how to say, 'I don't know' and spend more time reading manuals and understanding the machines that they are selling than picking and grinning. Music stores and support... You can tune a guitar, but you can't tuna fish!