American Song Contest

A Contest of Our Own!

Starting in 2022, American broadcaster NBC started an adaptation of the Swedish national selection Melodifestivalen called The American Song Contest. In this event, original songs from each of the 50 states; Washington, DC (the capital); and the five inhabited territories (Puerto Rico, Guam, US Virgin Islands, American Samoa, and Northern Mariana Islands). Adapting MelFest was probably chosen because 1) the lead producer of ASC is Christer Björkman – the Swedish executive producer of MelFest for the past two decades or so and puppet master of the Eurovision Song Contest since 2013, and 2) trying to equitably divvy 56 competitors between just two semi-finals could be overwhelming. I’ll be giving coverage to this event in terms of live notes for the televised shows, post-Contest summary, and a tournament during the summer. I cannot do much more than that as the songs are not released until they have been performed on television. Year-round coverage also will not be in place until there is more transparency with how artists and songs are selected as well as more history to discuss and debate. Until then, I’ll be posting my coverage of ASC (which I will also call “US MelFest”) here.

2022 – The Debut