Lied van Liedjes 23

This was the twenty-third Lied van Liedjes to be held. Semi-Finals would occur on the Monday 24th, Tuesday 25th and Wednesday 26th June 2002. Golden Duels / Second Chance night would occur on Friday 28th June 2002 with the final happening on Saturday 29th June 2002.

=Organization= Helsinki was chosen as the host city as the capital of Finland internally by the tourism sector of the Finnish government. Hans Weiss would continue as executive producer, while Annie McLoad would return as director for the first time in two consecutive editions. Eila Kekkonen was chosen by the Finnish broadcaster as coordinator.

=Contest= Due to the contest being hosted in Finland, similar to Gibraltar, an autonomous region of Finland would take part:. Alongside this, the returned after saving up in their budget for 2 years, and due to the Nordic influences. finally made their return following two years of protest on the increased participation fee, which was lowered in the previous edition. rejoined the contest after it's non participation in the previous year with a new song which was selected through a national final. withdrew due to financial concerns.

The edition would continue on with regional semi finals from the previous edition but balance them to contain the same amount of songs. Essentially this would match two pre-existing pots together in different regions. With 45 participating nations, with 5 automatic qualifiers, that left 40 nations to be spread across 3 semi-finals. The first semi final would have 14 countries, while the other 2 would have 13 countries so the show could open in an existing way. 6 would qualify from each semi-final, with 2 going to second chance from each. Golden Duels would produce an extra 3 qualifiers for a total of 26 finalists.

The automatic qualifiers were:, , , ,

=Semi Finals=

Semi Final 3
=Finals=

Grand Final
=Other Countries= Didn't participate with no official statement: Didn't participate due to general financial issues:
 * - no official statement made. they last took part in the 16th edition
 * - no official statement made. they last took part in the 19th edition
 * - no official statement made. they last took part in the 19th edition
 * - no official statement made. they last took part in the 16th edition
 * - no official statement made. they last took part in the 20th edition
 * - no official statement made. they last took part in the 19th edition
 * -no official statement made. they last took part in the 19th edition
 * - no official statement made. they last took part in the 10th edition
 * - no official statement made. they have yet to debut. the 20th edition
 * - no official statement made. they have yet to debut.
 * - no official statement made. they last took part in the 19th edition
 * - no official statement made. they last took part in the 19th edition
 * - no official statement made. they last took part in the 20th edition
 * - no official statement made. they have yet to debut.
 * - no official statement made. they have yet to debut.
 * - no official statement made. they have yet to debut.
 * - participated in the previous edition with financial help from three nations, and withdrew from the current edition stating financial reasons.
 * - announced they would not take part in the 23rd edition due to financial reasons. they last took part in the 18th edition
 * - announced they would not take part in the 23rd edition due to financial reasons. they last took part in the 18th edition
 * - under a contract to take part independently every other edition, with this edition being absent and participating as part of, although they didn't appear independently in the previous edition despite this. possible financial problems.
 * - announced they would not take part in the 23rd edition due to financial reasons. they last took part in the 18th edition