HELSINKI, FINLAND – Finnish national broadcaster announced they are receiving songs for UMK 2016, the show through which the country will decide its 2016 Eurovision Song Contest entry.
MORE INFORMATION IN FINNISH HERE
RULES HIGHLIGHTS
- The entry must be previously unreleased. Demos must be sent to the contest between September 1st noon and September 8th noon in 2015. Only demos which meet this deadline and these rules may take part in the contest..
- The demo and other requested material can be delivered either by uploading them in a digital form to Yleโs server or mailing them on a memory stick (addresses and technical requirements are at the end of these rules). If you send the material on a memory stick download, fill in and sign the entry form that you find at yle.fi/umk.
- Artists may take part as solo singers in just one song but they can be group members in another song. The creators of the songs (writers, lyricists, arrangers) may participate with numerous entries. The singer or the group that performs the song on a demo must also be the final performer of the number.
- Demos must be sung, be of a high production standard and, besides the melody, also the outlines and ideas of the final arrangement must be heard in them.
- A jury of experts appointed by YLE pick up the entries (artist + song) that go further out of all the songs that were sent to the contest. The viewing public votes the finalists out of the contestants that have gone further. The semifinals are broadcast live on television.
- The winning song is picked on the UMK final in a live broadcast in March 2016. The winner is committed to represent Finland in the international Eurovision Song Contest of 2016 with an entry that complies with the rules of EBU.
- At least one of the writers and the lead singer(s) has to be a Finnish citizen or live in Finland permanently. The language of the song may be chosen freely. The winner has to bear in mind that, according to EBUโs rules, the lyrics of the song may not be political or offensive and that they cannot include swearwords or trademarks.
