Malmö will host the 68th edition of the Eurovision Song Contest from May 7 to 11, 2024, public broadcaster SVT said on Friday. Located at the southern end of the country, it is the third largest city in Sweden.
"Malmö is a creative city with a rich cultural life that can create a music festival for the whole of Europe in a sustainable way, especially financially, since the arena (...) and the logistics are already in place," Hanna Stjärne, CEO of SVT, said in a statement.
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This is the seventh time that Sweden, a country where the competition is followed religiously, has hosted the contest, the year it will celebrate fifty years since its first hit "Waterloo", by the legendary band ABBA. The city has hosted it twice before, in 1992 and again in 2013. "The EBU (European Broadcasting Union, which is leading the competition) is delighted that Malmö has been chosen as the host city for the Eurovision Song Contest 2024," said Martin Österdahl, Executive Supervisor of the Eurovision Song Contest.
162 million viewers
The 2023 edition, organized because of the war by the United Kingdom in place of the victorious Ukraine the previous year, was won by Sweden thanks to the singer Loreen, with her title "Tattoo", a pop anthem about unconditional love. Already crowned in 2012, she is the second artist to win Eurovision twice after Johnny Logan for Ireland in the 1980s, and the first woman to achieve the double.
The event, launched in 1956, has grown in popularity over the years. The 67th edition of the contest was watched by 162 million viewers, the BBC announced last May. In Sweden, 2.3 million people watched the final, for an audience share of 82.3%.