Finland in the Eurovision Song Contest 2021

Eurovision Song Contest 2021
Country	Finland
National selection
Selection process	Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2021
Selection date(s)	20 February 2021
Selected entrant	Blind Channel
Selected song	"Dark Side"
Selected songwriter(s)	Aleksi Kaunisvesi Joel Hokka Joonas Porko Niko Moilanen Olli Matela
Finals performance
Semi-final result	Qualified (5th, 234 points)
Final result	6th, 301 points
Finland in the Eurovision Song Contest
◄2020 • 2021 • 2022►

Finland participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2021 with the song "Dark Side" written by Aleksi Kaunisvesi, Joonas Porko, Joel Hokka, Niko Moilanen and Olli Matela. The song was performed by the band Blind Channel. The Finnish broadcaster Yleisradio (Yle) organised the national final Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2021 in order to select the Finnish entry for the 2021 contest in Rotterdam, Netherlands. Seven entries were selected to compete in the national final on 20 February 2021 where the combination of votes from seven international jury groups and votes from the public selected "Dark Side" performed by Blind Channel as the winner.

Finland was drawn to compete in the second semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest which took place on 20 May 2021. Performing during the show in position 14, "Dark Side" was announced among the top 10 entries of the second semi-final and therefore qualified to compete in the final on 22 May. It was later revealed that Finland placed fifth out of the 17 participating countries in the semi-final with 234 points. In the final, Finland performed in position 16 and placed sixth out of the 26 participating countries, scoring 301 points.

Background

Main article: Finland in the Eurovision Song Contest

Prior to the 2021 Contest, Finland had participated in the Eurovision Song Contest fifty-three times since its first entry in 1961. Finland has won the contest once in 2006 with the song "Hard Rock Hallelujah" performed by Lordi. In the 2019 contest, "Look Away" performed by Darude featuring Sebastian Rejman failed to qualify Finland to the final, placing seventeenth (last) in the semi-final. In the 2020 contest, Aksel Kankaanranta was set to represent Finland with the song "Looking Back" before the contest's cancellation.

The Finnish national broadcaster, Yleisradio (Yle), broadcasts the event within Finland and organises the selection process for the nation's entry. Yle confirmed their intentions to participate at the 2021 Eurovision Song Contest on 7 March 2020. ^[1] Finland's entries for the Eurovision Song Contest have been selected through national final competitions that have varied in format over the years. Between 1961 and 2011, a selection show that was often titled Euroviisukarsinta highlighted that the purpose of the program was to select a song for Eurovision. However, since 2012, the broadcaster has organised the selection show Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu (UMK), which focuses on showcasing new music with the winning song being selected as the Finnish Contest entry for that year. Along with their participation confirmation, the broadcaster also announced that the Finnish entry for the 2021 contest would be selected through Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2021. ^[1]

Before Eurovision

Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2021

Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2021 was the tenth edition of Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu (UMK), the music competition that selects Finland's entries for the Eurovision Song Contest. The competition consisted of a final on 20 February 2021, held at the Mediapolis in Tampere and hosted by Antti Tuisku. The show was broadcast on Yle TV1 with a second audio program providing commentary in Finnish by Mikko Silvennoinen, in Swedish by Eva Frantz and Johan Lindroos, in Russian by Levan Tvaltvadze and in English by Katri Norrlin and Jani Kareinen, as well as online at Yle Areena. The competition was also broadcast via radio on Yle Radio Suomi and with commentary in Swedish by Eva Frantz and Johan Lindroos on Yle X3M . ^[2] The competition was watched by 1.1 million viewers in Finland, making it the most watched edition of UMK since its establishment in 2012. ^[3]

Competing entries

A submission period was opened by Yle which lasted between 1 September 2020 and 7 September 2020. At least one of the writers and the lead singer(s) had to hold Finnish citizenship or live in Finland permanently in order for the entry to qualify to compete. ^[4] A panel of eight experts appointed by Yle selected seven entries for the competition from the 278 received submissions. The experts were Tapio Hakanen (Head of Music at YleX), Anssi Autio (UMK producer), Juha-Matti Valtonen (television director), Samuli Väänänen (Senior Editor at Spotify Finland), Mirva Merimaa (CEO of Tiketti), Katri Norrlin (music journalist at YleX), Jani Kareinen (music journalist at YleX), Johan Lindroos (Head of Music at Yle Radio Suomi ) and Amie Borgar (Head of Music at Yle X3M). ^[2] The competing entries were presented during on 13 January 2021, while their lyric videos were released between 14 and 22 January 2021. Among the competing artists was Laura, who represented Estonia in the Eurovision Song Contest 2005 and 2017, and Aksel, who was to represent Finland in the Eurovision Song Contest 2020 before the contest was cancelled. ^[5]

Artist	Song	Songwriter(s)
Aksel	"Hurt"	Gerard O'Connell, Kalle Lindroth, Joonas Angeria
Blind Channel	"Dark Side"	Aleksi Kaunisvesi, Joel Hokka, Joonas Porko, Niko Moilanen, Olli Matela
Danny	"Sinä päivänä kun kaikki rakastaa mua"	Janne Rintala
Ilta  [ fi ]	"Kelle mä soitan"	Ilta Fuchs, Väinö Wallenius, Jouni Aslak, Tuomas Kauhanen
Laura	"Play"	Karl-Ander Reismann, Reinis Straume, Laura Põldvere
Oskr	"Lie"	Oskari Ruohonen, Joonas Angeria, David Pramik
Teflon Brothers and Pandora	"I Love You"	Jaakko Salovaara, Axel Ehnström, Mikko Kuoppala, Heikki Kuula, Jani Tuohimaa, Anneli Magnusson

Final

The final took place on 20 February 2021 where seven entries competed. "Dark Side" performed by Blind Channel was selected as the winner by a combination of public votes (75%) and seven international jury groups from Iceland, Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States (25%). The viewers had a total of 882 points to award, while the juries had a total of 294 points to award. Each jury group distributed their points as follows: 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 and 12 points. The viewer vote was based on the percentage of votes each song achieved through the following voting methods: telephone, SMS and app voting. For example, if a song gained 10% of the viewer vote, then that entry would be awarded 10% of 882 points rounded to the nearest integer: 88 points. A total of 138,195 votes were cast during the show: 46,178 votes through telephone and SMS and 92,017 votes through the Yle app. ^[6]

In addition to the performances of the competing entries, the show was opened by Antti Tuisku and Erika Vikman, while the interval act featured Haloo Helsinki! performing their single "Piilotan mun kyyneleet" and Antti Tuisku performing a medley of his songs. ^[7]

Final – 20 February 2021

Draw	Artist	Song	Jury	Televote			Total	Place
				Votes	Percentage	Points
1	Teflon Brothers and Pandora	"I Love You"	30	23,493	17.0%	150	180	2
2	Aksel	"Hurt"	56	8,154	5.9%	52	108	5
3	Laura	"Play"	4	1,382	1.0%	9	13	7
4	Danny	"Sinä päivänä kun kaikki rakastaa mua"	22	5,942	4.3%	38	60	6
5	Oskr	"Lie"	62	8,292	6.0%	53	115	4
6	Blind Channel	"Dark Side"	72	75,040	54.3%	479	551	1
7	Ilta	"Kelle mä soitan"	48	15,892	11.5%	101	149	3

Detailed International Jury Votes

Draw	Song								Total
1	"I Love You"	6	2	2		6	4	10	30
2	"Hurt"	10	12	8	8	4	8	6	56
3	"Play"				2		2		4
4	"Sinä päivänä kun kaikki rakastaa mua"	4	4	4	4	2		4	22
5	"Lie"	8	10	10	10	12	10	2	62
6	"Dark Side"	12	8	12	12	8	12	8	72
7	"Kelle mä soitan"	2	6	6	6	10	6	12	48
International Jury Spokespersons
United Kingdom: William Lee Adams   Switzerland: Zibbz  United States: Carlton Wilborn  Poland: Lanberry  Iceland: Klemens Hannigan  Spain: Soraya Arnelas  Netherlands: Katja Zwart

International Jury Members [3]
United Kingdom	William Lee Adams Ricardo Autobahn Michael James Down Katya Edwards
Switzerland	Daniel Meister Corinne Gfeller Stee Gfeller Pele Loriano
United States	Carlton Wilborn Robin Antin Tayla Parx Brett McLaughlin
Poland	Małgorzata Uściłowska Monika Malec Filip Siejka  [ pl ] Mikołaj Trybulec
Iceland	Felix Bergsson  [ is ] Klemens Hannigan Margrét Blöndal Erla Stefánsdóttir
Spain	Victor Escudero Soraya Arnelas Raúl López Vázquez Julia Varela
Netherlands	Erik Bolks Katja Zwart Jade van Baest Jeffrey van Hest

At Eurovision

According to Eurovision rules, all nations with the exceptions of the host country and the "Big Five" (France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom) are required to qualify from one of two semi-finals in order to compete for the final; the top ten countries from each semi-final progress to the final. The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) split up the competing countries into six different pots based on voting patterns from previous contests, with countries with favourable voting histories put into the same pot. The semi-final allocation draw held for the Eurovision Song Contest 2020 on 28 January 2020 was used for the 2021 contest, which Finland was placed into the second semi-final, to be held on 20 May 2021, and was scheduled to perform in the second half of the show. ^[8]

Once all the competing songs for the 2021 contest had been released, the running order for the semi-finals was decided by the shows' producers rather than through another draw, so that similar songs were not placed next to each other. Finland was set to perform in position 14, following the entry from Bulgaria and before the entry from Latvia. ^[9]

The two semi-finals and the final were televised in Finland on Yle TV1 with a second audio program providing commentary in Finnish by Mikko Silvennoinen, in Swedish by Eva Frantz and Johan Lindroos and in Russian by Levan Tvaltvadze. The three shows were broadcast via radio with Finnish commentary by Sanna Pirkkalainen and Toni Laaksonen on Yle Radio Suomi and with Swedish commentary by Eva Frantz and Johan Lindroos on Yle X3M . ^{[10] [11]} The Finnish spokesperson, who announced the top 12-point score awarded by the Finnish jury during the final, was Katri Norrlin.

Semi-final

Finland performed fourteenth in the second semi-final, following the entry from Bulgaria and preceding the entry from Latvia. At the end of the show, Finland was announced as having finished in the top 10 and subsequently qualifying for the grand final. It was later revealed that Finland placed fifth in the semi-final, receiving a total of 234 points: 150 points from the televoting and 84 from the juries.

Final

Shortly after the second semi-final, a winners' press conference was held for the ten qualifying countries. As part of this press conference, the qualifying artists took part in a draw to determine which half of the grand final they would subsequently participate in. Finland was drawn to compete in the second half. Following this draw, the shows' producers decided upon the running order of the final, as they had done for the semi-finals. Finland was subsequently placed to perform in position 16, following the entry from Germany and before the entry from Bulgaria. Finland placed sixth in the final, scoring 301 points: 218 points from the televoting and 83 from the juries.

Voting

Voting during the three shows involved each country awarding two sets of points from 1-8, 10 and 12: one from their professional jury and the other from televoting. Each nation's jury consisted of five music industry professionals who are citizens of the country they represent. This jury judged each entry based on: vocal capacity; the stage performance; the song's composition and originality; and the overall impression by the act. ^[12] In addition, each member of a national jury may only take part in the panel once every three years, and no jury was permitted to discuss of their vote with other members or be related in any way to any of the competing acts in such a way that they cannot vote impartially and independently. The individual rankings of each jury member in an anonymised form as well as the nation's televoting results were released shortly after the grand final. ^{[13] [14]}

Below is a breakdown of points awarded to Finland and awarded by Finland in the second semi-final and grand final of the contest, and the breakdown of the jury voting and televoting conducted during the two shows:

Points awarded to Finland

Points awarded to Finland (Semi-final 2) [15] Score Televote Jury 12 points   Bulgaria   Poland 10 points   Denmark   Estonia   Iceland   San Marino   Serbia 8 points   Czech Republic   Greece   Latvia   Moldova   United Kingdom 7 points   Denmark   Estonia   France   Latvia 6 points   Georgia   Portugal   Spain    Switzerland   Albania   Czech Republic   Iceland   Portugal   Serbia    Switzerland   United Kingdom 5 points   Albania   Austria   Austria 4 points   Georgia 3 points   San Marino 2 points   France   Poland 1 point

Points awarded to Finland (Final) [16] Score Televote Jury 12 points   Estonia   Iceland   Sweden 10 points   Italy   Serbia 8 points   Bulgaria   Germany   Italy   Latvia   Russia   Ukraine   Belgium   Denmark   Romania 7 points   Denmark   Lithuania   Malta   Serbia   United Kingdom   Estonia 6 points   Belgium   Croatia   Greece   Norway   Poland   Romania 5 points   Azerbaijan   Ireland   Moldova   Portugal   Iceland 4 points   Austria   Cyprus   Czech Republic   Israel   Netherlands   San Marino   Slovenia    Switzerland   Latvia   Slovenia   United Kingdom 3 points   Albania   Australia   Albania   Cyprus 2 points   North Macedonia   Spain   Malta   Poland 1 point   France   Austria   Bulgaria   Czech Republic   San Marino    Switzerland

Points awarded by Finland

Points awarded by Finland (Semi-final 2) [15] Score Televote Jury 12 points   Iceland   Bulgaria 10 points    Switzerland    Switzerland 8 points   Denmark   Iceland 7 points   Estonia   Portugal 6 points   Portugal   Greece 5 points   Moldova   Austria 4 points   Bulgaria   Albania 3 points   Albania   Serbia 2 points   Greece   San Marino 1 point   San Marino   Denmark

Points awarded by Finland (Final) [16] Score Televote Jury 12 points   Iceland    Switzerland 10 points   Ukraine   Bulgaria 8 points   Italy   Iceland 7 points    Switzerland   France 6 points   France   Italy 5 points   Lithuania   Sweden 4 points   Norway   Russia 3 points   Sweden   Lithuania 2 points   Moldova   Greece 1 point   Russia   Malta

Detailed voting results

The following members comprised the Finnish jury: ^{[13] [14] [17]}

• Amie Borgar
• Jussi Mäntysaari
• Mirva Merimaa
• Tommi Tuomainen
• Samuli Väänänen

Detailed voting results from Finland (Semi-final 2) ^[15]

Draw	Country	Jury							Televote
		Juror A	Juror B	Juror C	Juror D	Juror E	Rank	Points	Rank	Points
01	San Marino	5	12	14	9	7	9	2	10	1
02	Estonia	11	11	8	6	15	12		4	7
03	Czech Republic	14	16	10	5	16	13		15
04	Greece	4	6	6	8	10	5	6	9	2
05	Austria	6	8	7	12	6	6	5	14
06	Poland	12	15	13	14	11	16		16
07	Moldova	13	9	12	11	9	14		6	5
08	Iceland	3	5	3	1	2	3	8	1	12
09	Serbia	9	10	9	16	4	8	3	11
10	Georgia	16	14	15	7	14	15		12
11	Albania	10	4	11	10	8	7	4	8	3
12	Portugal	7	7	5	4	5	4	7	5	6
13	Bulgaria	2	1	2	2	1	1	12	7	4
14	Finland
15	Latvia	15	3	16	13	12	11		13
16	Switzerland	1	2	1	3	3	2	10	2	10
17	Denmark	8	13	4	15	13	10	1	3	8

Detailed voting results from Finland (Final) ^[16]

Draw	Country	Jury							Televote
		Juror A	Juror B	Juror C	Juror D	Juror E	Rank	Points	Rank	Points
01	Cyprus	20	22	22	15	16	22		17
02	Albania	9	9	16	24	11	14		18
03	Israel	17	6	15	13	7	11		21
04	Belgium	15	13	9	17	12	15		14
05	Russia	24	3	18	9	8	7	4	10	1
06	Malta	6	11	21	22	6	10	1	11
07	Portugal	11	15	12	8	10	13		12
08	Serbia	12	21	14	25	9	18		22
09	United Kingdom	19	25	23	12	17	20		25
10	Greece	8	7	8	10	14	9	2	13
11	Switzerland	4	2	1	3	1	1	12	4	7
12	Iceland	5	10	3	1	5	3	8	1	12
13	Spain	21	17	7	18	13	17		24
14	Moldova	23	20	25	21	25	25		9	2
15	Germany	22	16	17	20	18	23		19
16	Finland
17	Bulgaria	2	1	2	5	2	2	10	16
18	Lithuania	10	5	11	7	20	8	3	6	5
19	Ukraine	25	12	5	11	15	12		2	10
20	France	1	18	4	6	3	4	7	5	6
21	Azerbaijan	13	24	24	16	24	21		15
22	Norway	16	23	6	14	23	16		7	4
23	Netherlands	18	8	20	19	21	19		23
24	Italy	3	4	10	4	4	5	6	3	8
25	Sweden	7	14	13	2	19	6	5	8	3
26	San Marino	14	19	19	23	22	24		20

References

1. Granger, Anthony (7 March 2020). "Finland: YLE Confirms UMK Will Be An Open Selection in 2021". Eurovoix. Retrieved 8 September 2021.
2. "Tässä ovat UMK21-finalistit – "Kaikkien aikojen kovin kattaus"". Yle (in Finnish). 13 January 2021. Retrieved 15 January 2021.
3. Granger, Anthony (21 February 2021). "🇫🇮 Finland: UMK 2021 Breaks Viewing Records". Eurovoix. Retrieved 22 February 2021.
4. Jumawan, Tim (2 September 2020). "Finland to select their 2021 Eurovision entry on February 20". escXtra. Retrieved 11 January 2021.
5. "Latest news: Finland's Aksel is back for UMK!". Eurovision.tv . EBU. 13 January 2021. Archived from the original on 13 January 2021. Retrieved 13 January 2021.
6. "Uuden Musiikin Kilpailulla ennätysyleisö – finaalia seurasi 1,7 miljoonaa katsojaa". yle.fi (in Finnish). 21 February 2021. Retrieved 24 February 2021.
7. Farren, Neil (17 February 2021). "Finland: Haloo Helsinki! to Perform at UMK 2021". Eurovoix. Retrieved 8 September 2021.
8. Groot, Evert (17 November 2020). "2020 Semi-Final line-up to stay for 2021". eurovision.tv. European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 18 November 2020. Retrieved 17 November 2020.
9. "Semi-Final running orders revealed". Eurovision.tv. 30 March 2021. Retrieved 30 March 2021.
10. "Yle tarjoaa ison joukon euroviisuihin liittyviä ohjelmia toukokuussa – viisuhuuma huipentuu suoriin lähetyksiin Rotterdamista". yle.fi (in Finnish). Retrieved 12 April 2021.
11. "Euroviisut 2021: 1. semifinaalilähetys suorana Rotterdamista | Audio Areena". areena.yle.fi (in Finnish). Retrieved 15 May 2021.
12. "Voting–Eurovision Song Contest". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 26 May 2021. Retrieved 26 May 2021.
13. "Juries in the Second Semi-Final of Rotterdam 2021". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 26 May 2021. Retrieved 26 May 2021.
14. "Juries in the Grand Final of Rotterdam 2021". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 26 May 2021. Retrieved 26 May 2021.
15. "Results of the Second Semi-Final of Rotterdam 2021". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 27 May 2021. Retrieved 27 May 2021.
16. "Results of the Grand Final of Rotterdam 2021". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 27 May 2021. Retrieved 27 May 2021.
17. Saulo, Sandra; Tauriainen, Iina; Laitila, Tiia-Mari (23 May 2021). "Suomi oli Euroviisuissa ennätyksellisen hienosti kuudentena – Katso miten pisteet jakautuivat maittain". yle.fi (in Finnish). Yle. Archived from the original on 27 May 2021. Retrieved 27 May 2021.

External links

• Official Yle Eurovision site
• Official Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2021 site ^{[ permanent dead link ]}