The Finnish broadcaster Yle has revealed more info about next year’s Finnish national selection for Eurovision, UMK 2023. It was told earlier today that UMK23 takes place on February 25th 2023 in Turku’s Logomo. The seven finalists of UMK23 will be revealed on January 11th 2023.
According to Yle, overall 363 songs were sent to UMK23, which tells that the new season of UMK interests artists and songwriters. Tapio Hakanen, the head of the UMK23 jury and the musical leader of the radio channel YleX, tells the jury had a hard job choosing the seven finalists and the expectations are once again very high. Among the seven finalists there are both well-known artists and new talents:
There is among other things the greatest dance song of the UMK-history with a really amazing new singer, very well-known artist’s sexy song, a great ballad from one of the most significant international export hopes of Finland, bands that are in the rise of fame and in the grand favor and the biggest rap-banger of the UMK-history.
During the last couple of years UMK has been a big success and many of the competing songs have become big hits in Finland. For example, all songs of UMK22 made it to the Top50-list of the Finnish Spotify and they have been listened for over 31 million times. Ram pam pam by BESS, which finished 3rd in UMK22, has been the most played song in the Finnish radio stations this year. Also UMK22 runner-up Cyan Kicks has risen interest internationally and they announced in July that they’re making a tour in Germany in May 2023.
According to Yle, UMK23 will be an all-night show, which starts with a pre-party at 18.00 CET and ends with an after-party, which lasts until 3am CET. In the tv-show, which stars at 20.00 CET, we will get to see the seven competing songs with opening and interval acts. You can get to know the program and the performers of the show here: https://yle.fi/aihe/a/20-10003373. You can buy the tickets to UMK23 here: https://www.lippu.fi/artist/umk/.
As we can remember, UMK22 was won by The Rasmus and their song Jezebel. The Rasmus carried the Finnish flag in Turin last May, finishing 21th in the Grand Final:
