Brand new for the 2025 festival is the rahva lemmik (aka People’s Pick) artist. There are five artists to choose from: ALIKA, Curly Strings, NOËP, Puuluup and Trad.Attack!. The artist that receives the most votes will headline the 2025 festival, running May 22-25.
Voting opens Monday May 13 and runs until Sunday May 19.
There are 3 ways to vote:
- the EMW website
- Facebook stories poll
- Instagram stories poll.
The winner will be announced on Tuesday May 21 via social media.
Here's some more information on each of the artists:
ALIKA
ALIKA is a quickly rising star in not only the Estonian but international pop music scenes. With her powerhouse vocals and captivating performances, she has already wowed audiences in her homeland and worldwide. She shot to international stardom after her 2023 Eurovision performance of power ballad “Bridges.”
Curly Strings
Curly Strings is an acoustic four-piece band that draws its inspiration from their own personal heritage in the current Estonian cultural space. The band’s rise in the Estonian music scene in 2013 was a phenomenon unlike any other: a folk music artist became mainstream by collecting national music awards and being the top seller in music stores for more than a year.
NOËP
A trailblazer from Tallinn, Estonia, NOËP has carved out a unique niche in the music scene by fusing electronic and indie pop, amassing over 90 million streams on Spotify alone. In 2022 he was nominated for a record-breaking 6 awards, winning Male and Pop Artist of the Year and Album and Pop Album of the Year at the Estonian Music Awards for his debut No Man Is An Island. In 2023 NOËP hosted the first ever stadium show by an Estonian artist in Tallinn, breaking the attendance record of 14000 people.
Puuluup
Puuluup is a duo – Ramo Teder (Pastacas as a solo artist) and Marko Veisson. A pinch of surrealism, modern folklore and talharpa revival! The old and the new stick together like water and sleet in Puuluup’s oeuvre. The instruments – talharpas – represent tradition and folklore. The characteristically susurrus sounds of these instruments are sent through effect blocks and a looper. The lyrics and melodies are a mixture of our musical memories and improvisation.
Trad.Attack!
Trad.Attack! is an Estonian band that has turned the Estonian music market upside down by bringing traditional music and long-vanished village voices to big stages and onto magazine covers and becoming a source of inspiration for the younger generation. They build a modern world and an impressively big sound around archaic sounds. While realizing their huge musical ambition, Trad.Attack! is also pursuing a bigger master plan – to play live in every country in the world. The band's latest studio album Bring It On was released in March 2023.
So tell us, who will it be?
