Melodifestivalen goes Finland

I would of course never dream of poking fun at my adopted home country Finland. But like all Nordic countries, national hit songs were scarce back in the day and translating songs into the local lingo was common practice.

And Finland took quite a few Swedish songs, some from Melodifestivalen. This blog entry is probably more amusing for the good people out there with a better knowledge of MF and Sweden's entries.



Ami Aspelund - Waterloo (Sweden 1974)

Not only is the Finnish version of Abba's winner sung by Ami Aspelund, who would go on to represent Finland at ESC 1983 (while her sister Monica did the same in 1977), but the lyrics are penned by Seija Simola (Finland 1978). "Waterloo" was sung in every language everywhere, maybe some other versions captured the original spirit better than this one.



Meiju Suvas - A hua heija (Sweden 1982)

And this one... well, Meiju Suvas was apparently a keen follower of Sweden in Eurovision, as she made cover versions of their entries from 1983 and 1984 as well. What the title means in Finnish? Next question, please...



Eini - Haloo hela Finland (Sweden NF 1982)

Sometimes, even non-winners from MF were deemed good enough to cover in Finland. This was a big hit as well, sticking pretty closely to the original theme of the lyrics. Why the title is in "Swedish"? Next question, please...