Denmark is hardly a powerhouse of the Eurovision Song Contest, and in comparison to its nearest Nordic neighbour, Sweden, it looks puny. Together with Danish experts, Callum Rowe investigates why Denmark struggles to keep up in the competitive music industry. 

It seems completely unthinkable that Denmark’s best result at the Eurovision Song Contest in the last ten editions almost never happened. Had one thing played out differently, Denmark wouldn’t have come anywhere near to winning Eurovision, and its recent record at the contest would’ve looked even bleaker. 

In 2013, Emmelie de Forest won Eurovision for Denmark with Only Teardrops, but it was almost by default that she had the opportunity to compete. When producers of Denmark’s national selection show for Eurovision, Dansk Melodi Grand Prix, first drafted the list of 10 artists to battle it out for the right to fly the Dannebrog in Malmö, de Forest’s name was nowhere to be seen. Songwriters Lise Cabble, Julia Fabrin Jakobsen and Thomas Stengaard had originally penned Only Teardrops with the intention of it being used by another country at that year’s contest. 

Ole Tøpholm, Denmark’s Eurovision commentator, explains: “The song was not meant to be in Dansk Melodi Grand Prix originally. It was only because another song got kicked out of the contest before people knew which 10 songs were originally selected. The song was almost a wildcard.” Some things are meant to be, and Only Teardrops being a wildcard might well have been one of those. 

The added pressure on any broadcaster hosting Eurovision naturally causes assets, resources and manpower to be redeployed to the main event, leaving the televised national selection – and the process to select the songs to compete in it – to be something of an afterthought. Ironically, Dansk Melodi Grand Prix in 2014 was just as strong as it had been in the years prior, and it bred a home entry that finished higher in the Grand Final than Sweden’s did 12 months beforehand. Since the introduction of the modern 26-song Grand Final in 2012, home entries have secured an average result of just 17th, but Basim – representing Denmark in Copenhagen in 2014 – placed ninth. 

“The lead singer just didn’t have it.”

Chief 1

After a couple of pleasing placings, Denmark’s result at the 2015 contest in Vienna was a reality check for broadcaster DR. “Fuck, det er ærgerligt,” (“Fuck, what a shame”) Tøpholm exclaimed to nearly a million Danes who watched live on television as Anti Social Media crashed out of their Semi-Finals, ensuring Denmark missed out on the Grand Final for the first time since 2007. The Way You Are was written by Lars “Chief 1” Pedersen and Remee Jackman. “Remee and I wanted to do a Beatle boy band thing, but it wasn’t the right time for that,” Chief 1 says. But there was more to it than it being the wrong time. “The lead singer just didn’t have it. The little guitarist should have been the lead singer because he has so much stamina and everyone loved him, but he couldn’t sing,” he adds. 

“People want artists from Denmark who can say hello and goodbye in Danish.”

Ole Tøpholm

In 2016, a song in Dansk Melodi Grand Prix written by Emmelie de Forest started to gather momentum across Europe. Never Alone was performed by Anja Nissen, but there was a problem. Nissen is Australian. “People want artists from Denmark who can say hello and goodbye in Danish,” Tøpholm says. The Danish public instead chose a song by the group Lighthouse X, fronted by actor and singer Johannes Nymark. His popularity was higher than ever having recently won hearts on Vild Med Dans, Denmark’s version of Strictly Come Dancing, which contributed to his group winning the ticket to represent Denmark at Eurovision; a swift return ticket. Lighthouse X went straight back home after failing to qualify for the Grand Final. Could Nissen have done better? “Never Alone was a better song and I think it would’ve been another result in Eurovision,” Tøpholm reckons. 

Nissen got her chance at Eurovision 12 months later, but not before putting in the hard yards to convince the Danish public she deserved the chance to represent the country on the European stage. She took Denmark back to the Eurovision Grand Final which was a measurable success after two non-qualifications in a row. Nissen’s qualification to the Grand Final was followed up a year later by Rasmussen. His song Higher Ground – written by Swedes Karl Eurén and Niclas Arn – had been declined by producers of Melodifestivalen in Sweden before those in charge at DR got wind of it and quickly snapped it up. Ironically, Higher Ground secured nearly ten times as many points from the televoters in the Grand Final of Eurovision as Sweden’s contribution, and bagged Denmark’s best result since 2013. 

Denmark kicked on in 2019, qualifying from the Semi-Finals successfully for the third year on the bounce. Leonora’s track Love Is Forever had some songwriting input from Lise Cabble which helped it to 12th overall. 

2020 was certainly a “what if?” year for Denmark. On the eve of Dansk Melodi Grand Prix, the Danish Government brought in emergency legislation to limit the size of indoor gatherings in a bid to limit the spread of COVID-19, putting paid to the idea of 17,000 fans watching the show inside Copenhagen’s Royal Arena. Ben & Tan won the show in the totally empty hall, and it was one of the only times they’d perform the song live. Eurovision was cancelled meaning the fan-favourite song never had the chance to continue Denmark’s continued mini renaissance. 

Emerging from the pandemic in 2021, Danes saw hope in the band Fyr og Flamme, and Denmark’s first Eurovision song fully in Danish since the Chief 1-penned Stemmen I Mit Liv in 1997. Despite the energetic duo performing in the statistically handsome closing spot of their Semi-Final, they failed to reach the Grand Final of Eurovision. “I think it was because it was in Danish and not in English,” Tøpholm says. Without Denmark in the Eurovision Grand Final, viewers have fewer reasons to tune in. 

Executives at DR promoted Erik Struve Hansen – a former music journalist and a stalwart of entertainment television in Denmark – to help navigate a turnaround in fortunes and declining viewing figures ahead of 2022. 

Chief 1 returned as a songwriter in 2022. He was “hoping for a girl band revolution” after writing The Show for the band Reddi. Looking back, he knew the song didn’t have what it took. “We actually had three songs to select from and everyone was saying, ‘This song, no, this song, no, this song’. That taught me that you have to have the song that everyone loves.” Although Reddi won Dansk Melodi Grand Prix, voters at the contest in Turin were far from favourable and kicked the band out of their Semi-Final. “Nothing could have saved that because it was too boring for Eurovision,” Tøpholm concedes. 

2023 saw TikTok megastar Reiley win a multidimensional failure of an edition of Dansk Melodi Grand Prix, caused most significantly by a catastrophic failure of the public voting app. “Last year was a disaster with the sounds, with the staging; everything was a disaster,” Tøpholm says. Although the show was marred, Hansen and his team at DR still looked positively towards Liverpool. However, Reiley didn’t attract enough votes from the public to reach the Grand Final. “If you have a TikTok star and put him into old fashioned TV, that’s a problem. They almost tried to do TikTok for three minutes, but you can’t do that,” Tøpholm says. 

After failing to qualify for the Grand Final of Eurovision three years in a row, Hansen stripped everything back and gave Dansk Melodi Grand Prix a reset. 2024 was the first year since the turn of the century that the show wasn’t hosted in one of Denmark’s arenas. Instead, it was held in the DR Koncerthuset, the broadcaster’s own 1,800-seater concert hall. Tøpholm says this back-to-basics strategy is about “getting DMGP to survive”. 

Money is a big issue for DR. It – like many other participating broadcasters in Eurovision – is a public service broadcaster, relying on obligatory funding from eligible taxpayers. A new funding model for DR was gradually phased in from 2019, and since January 2022 the broadcaster has been funded through an additional income tax, a change from the previous licence fee model. The implementation of this new model has resulted in a 20% reduction in DR’s funding which affects its ability to create the same high-quality output as it previously had done. Naturally, this has a knock-on effect on Dansk Melodi Grand Prix and Eurovision. 

“DR needs to put more money and effort into it. I’m not saying it to put them down. They know it.”

Chief 1

Chief 1 had to fight with DR to let Reddi have a grand piano on stage in Turin. He won, but not before being told “there’s no money for that” time after time, and having the suggestion floated that the band use just a keyboard instead. That wasn’t Chief 1’s first financial battle with DR. When a Chief 1 and Remee Jackman-penned song represented Denmark in 2012, it was their responsibility as songwriters to contribute to the 150,000kr bill for the transportation of Soluna Samay’s band’s equipment to and from Azerbaijan. 

The financial issue has a wider effect. “I know Thomas Stengaard doesn’t want to write for Denmark anymore because he loses money,” Chief 1 reveals. That’s the same Thomas Stengaard who wrote the Eurovision-winning Only Teardrops for Denmark. To have a Eurovision winner refusing to submit songs to DMGP must be a difficult pill to swallow for DR. Since his win in 2013, Stengaard has written Eurovision songs for Germany, Cyprus, San Marino and Azerbaijan, bagging results in Grand Finals that Denmark could only dream of. “DR needs to put more money and effort into it. I’m not saying it to put them down. They know it,” Chief 1 adds. 

“You just get dropped on your face by the production companies.”

Tim Schou

Funding cuts and the struggle to attract superstar songwriters aren’t the only barriers to success for Denmark. Tim Schou fronted A Friend In London that finished fifth for Denmark at Eurovision in 2011. “They [DR] tend to not follow up on the bands that they have on the show in terms of radio airplay… You just get dropped on your face by the production companies,” he says. Even Tøpholm – an employee of DR – agrees: “It’s not 100% that, but I agree with Tim – it has been a problem for many years.” 

Hansen enforces a safety net which aims to protect big artists when they compete in Dansk Melodi Grand Prix. After the first round of voting, the top three artists are named, while the five who don’t advance to the last round of voting in the competition don’t have their placings revealed to the public. “We do this to acknowledge that big concern from a lot of people in the Danish music industry,” he says. “They don’t want to be ranked eighth in front of the whole country. It could ruin their career if they think they look like a loser,” he adds. 

Despite this thoughtful approach to encourage Denmark’s biggest names to participate, the chart-toppers aren’t really interested. What needs to change? Tim Schou thinks it’s pretty easy: “All it takes is to just let those artists know, ‘Hey, if you participate in Eurovision, we are going to have your back on the radio’.” 

Whatever comes next for Denmark, Danes want it to be an improvement on its recent form. And Hansen’s aim is simple: “My goal is to change the narrative.”

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