In order to choose an entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 1988, Sweden held a national selection, namely Melodifestivalen 1988. The runaway winner was the ballad "Stad i ljus" sung by

Tommy Körberg Bert Gustav Tommy Körberg (; born 4 July 1948) is a Swedish singer, actor, and musician. English-speaking audiences know him best for his role as Anatoly/"The Russian" in the musical ''Chess''. He played the role on the 1984 concept album, and ...

, who also had represented Sweden at the 1969 contest. This time his song was written by Py Bäckman. It was the first time in the eighties that the Swedish entry was a ballad.

Before Eurovision

Melodifestivalen 1988

Melodifestivalen Melodifestivalen (; literally "the Melody Festival") is an annual song competition organised by Swedish public broadcasters Sveriges Television (SVT) and Sveriges Radio (SR). It determines the country's representative for the Eurovision Song ...

1988 was the selection for the 28th song to represent

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

at the

Eurovision Song Contest The Eurovision Song Contest (), sometimes abbreviated to ESC and often known simply as Eurovision, is an international songwriting competition organised annually by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), featuring participants representing pr ...

. It was the 27th time that this system of picking a song had been used. 1,100 songs were submitted to SVT for the competition. The final was held in the Malmö Stadsteater in

Malmö Malmö (, ; da, Malmø ) is the largest city in the Swedish county (län) of Scania (Skåne). It is the third-largest city in Sweden, after Stockholm and Gothenburg, and the sixth-largest city in the Nordic region, with a municipal populat ...

on 27 February 1988, presented by Bengt Grafström and was broadcast on TV2 and was not broadcast on radio. The show was watched by 4,464,000 people.

Voting

At Eurovision

Sweden performed second at the contest and received a total of 52 points and finished 12th.

Voting

References

External links

TV broadcastings at SVT's open archive
{{Melodifestivalen

1988 File:1988 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The oil platform Piper Alpha explodes and collapses in the North Sea, killing 165 workers; The USS Vincennes (CG-49) mistakenly shoots down Iran Air Flight 655; Australia celebrates its Australian ...

Countries in the Eurovision Song Contest 1988

Eurovision The Eurovision Song Contest (), sometimes abbreviated to ESC and often known simply as Eurovision, is an international songwriting competition organised annually by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), featuring participants representing pr ...