North Macedonia

Jana Burceska is wearing a different outfit than we saw in her first rehearsal, but very similar. Instead of dark green it is now black. Not much has changed in the performance itself, but the backdrop has now added panels (like billboards) that show - among different things - images from the official video clip. The city by night idea is still there, but a lot less obvious than a few days ago.

She's still alone on stage, makes sense of course, but with the choreography during the chorus it almost looks more like a workout ...

Vocally it still sounds ok and the whole performance is very nice to look at.

FYR Macedonia is definitely stepping up this year. Jana is probably not wearing her stage outfit just yet but the visuals look very well. I particularly like the parts in the beginning when a city view is shown on the backdrop.

Vocally she starts well but later on in the song she misses some notes during the chorus. Given the title of the song it should be no surprise that she is dancing (in a bit prooking way if I may add) and that she is alone on stage, but this latter fact also makes the stage very big for this type of song. Despite the whole theme of the song it would still be nice to see more happening on stage.

From Mike;

Latvia Yes
Poland Yes
Switzerland No
Israel Yes
Belarus Maybe
Serbia Yes
Ireland Yes
Macedonia Maybe
Lithuania No
Australia Yes
Slovenia No
Bulgaria Yes
Denmark Yes
Ukraine Yes
Norway No
Georgia No
Albania Maybe
Belgium Yes

I am really unsure about Ireland so may swop that with Macedonia or Belarus

From Daniel;

Latvia Yes
Poland Yes
Switzerland No
Israel Yes
Belarus No
Serbia Yes
Ireland Yes
Macedonia No
Lithuania No
Australia Yes
Slovenia Yes
Bulgaria Yes
Denmark No
Ukraine Yes
Norway No
Georgia No
Albania No
Belgium Yes

Daniel is unsure about Albania and Belarus and might swop those with Slovenia and Latvia

Rolling live blog of Jury Show Second semi

Keep Refreshing this page;

Opening;

Views of Globen and crowd shots and COME TOGETHER. Seem like quite a crowd in the area too which is nice.

Now we have lots of Swedish humour and comedy form the hosts, but this washes over me and leaves me very cold I am afraid. All a bit too much MF for my liking.

Both hosts resplendent in silver jacket for Mans and a dress for Petra....all very sparkly. And now we have a duet from the two of them....very smorgasbord like in Malmo

Latvia

Justs creates this emotional monster on stage as he leaps around and gives everything to the performance. For me it is slightly over doing things. Yes he has a great voice but this is not how to perform an Aminata song. That said the backdrop is just perfect for this. Sure fire qualifier but no winner....
Lots of crowd cheering for this though...
The graphics look amazing too

Poland

Michal always hits the spot for me. Simply effective staging for this seems to work. Nothing none of us have not seen on the promo tour or the rehearsal clips so far. He does seem to come to life on stage with his powerful voice and presence. The real issue is that the song is a bit weak both lyrically and musically. He tries his best but given what he has to work with this is not really doing it for me.
Juries should fall in love with this though.....the emotion in his eyes and connection with the camera is one of the highlights this year.
And words on the backdrop are always a no-no in my world, sorry

Switzerland

Sorry but this is going no where fast. No charism, no charm, nothing at all really. Tonight the blue hair is still there and this time it’s curly, but no amount of whacky clothes, designer hair or anything is saving this from being one of the 8 that go home.
3 minutes I will never get back

Israel

Simply perfection from Hovi, great presence, great voice, perfectly suited to this song…the stage really lifts this too, this could really scoop a lot of votes on final night. Yes qualifying and with a good draw on final night who knows?
The earnest emotion that he's given tonight does make me think that Hovi has a lot more to gibe as an artist in the future....and seeing the acrobats on screen for the first time I now get the the inclusion of them on the stage.
Oh and a pyro waterfall.....always love them.....can we have them in every song please?

Belarus

Amazing staging totally distracts from the weak song here, though IVAN does make good use of all the stage and performs the hell out of it. What would have happened if the guy had been given a half decent song to sing? Oh and the baby is still there. Weirdly.
But it's not all about the staging, it's about the song and this is getting totally lost after Israel and before Serbia
Also we have some missed camera angles tonight with his.....but he bring sit back by hitting all those important notes at the end of the song
And he does look amazingly cool on stage

More Eurovision Taxi moments, with some folks that we know.
While this is quite funny the guest appearances from Lordi really give away that this was totally contrived and constructed, which steal the magic for me

Serbia

Great song and great vocal BUT and it’s a small but, the staging is so dark that it loses something for me here. I feel ditched from the performance and slightly distracted by he dancer. But toward the end it starts to lift and when the backing vocalists gather around her it pulls it back a bit for me.
She is giving her all to this tonight though. however like Belarus we do have a few missed camera moments tonight too.

Didn't really see much of Macedonia's first rehearsal, but what I did notice was the four backing vocals and a drummer.

Vocally, Kaliopi is just outstanding as she has proven before. Soft blue colour scheme during the verses, flames and gold/yellow colour scheme during the chorus.

I like this a lot, and as one of the only nations to sing in their native language, I do hope Macedonia make it to the final.

What's one of the world's best kept secrets? The hospitality of Macedonia.

Yesterday, the Macedonian embassy and delegation of this year's Eurovision Song Contest invited a selection of Macedonian nationals and press people to build bridges in honour of their candidate Daniel Kajmakoski.

In the wonderful venue Novomatic Forum, filled with tables made of cones lit up in an orange and yellow colour, resembling the colours of the Macedonian flag, the Macedonians threw an amazing party by serving a selection of wonderfully tasty Macedonian wine, one of their best kept secrets easily giving French wine it's run for their money, and a selection of delicious great food. To top it all off, a huge cake with the Macedonian and Austrian flag, was the centre piece of all attention too.

Throughout the night, everyone attending were treated to a selection of music by one of Macedonia's most popular ethno band who performed a set of songs. Eventually this year's Eurovision winner Daniel Kajmakoski, joined them on stage for two songs, before singing an acoustic version of his Eurovision entry 'Autumn Leaves', accompanied by piano only. The crowd went wild and as the videos prove shown below, it was a great night. Bojana Stamenov, the Serbian representative this year, was also present, supporting Daniel during this performance.

Finishing the set, with his X Factor winner single 'Red', a cover sung originally by the Australian Daniel Merriweather, and a special surprise with a brand new video of 'Hold Me Now', a cover of Johnny Logan's winning Eurovision entry, Macedonia treated us to an amazing night of wonderful music, good food and wine and fantastic company.

Thank you to the Macedonian delegation for the amazing party and letting ESCKAZ be part of this magnificent and wonderful celebration.

Daniel from FYR Macedonia has really showcased his vocals during the rehearsal.

There's not an awful lot of changes in terms of the backdrop. However the little dance routine Daniel and his former Blackstreet guys did in the previous rehearsal are no longer included. Possibly for the best.

It looks a lot better that way.

Powerful vocals, I like this a lot!

As the performance starts we can see baroque columns on the background, afterwards Daniel appears in a trench coat wearing a designer white shirt with a strange design, looks like a black plastic bag or else was sewed to the front of the shirt.

At the chorus backing vocals appear, looking like R'n'B performers. And all of a these autumn leaves fluttering in the air are as a part of the effects. To me it looks a bit scattered; too many styles are mixed in one performance. I think they wanted to include everything possible to create a memorable show but overdid it a bit. To me it doesn't look totally finished; maybe the team will improve it later.

Good luck, Daniel!

Daniel Kamaykovski is rehearsing as the final semi artist for today, and he certainly didn't disappoint.
After it emerged last week, that three of the former Blackstreet-members would join Daniel on stage in Vienna, the expectations have been pretty high.
Let me tell you after seeing today's first rehearsal they certainly didn't disappoint. Autumn Leaves is already a beautiful piano-led mid tempo song, but the addition of the trio is giving the song an extra urban edge. So a big well done to the Macedonian guys already.

The backdrop is very pretty; it depicts a stone archway, from which occasionally autumn leaves are flowing through the wind.

When the backings come in, and they take part in the choreography, there's a bit of a boyband routine going on, which I personally think suits the song rather well. I'm loving the visual concept, its warm autumn colours and it just proves Macedonia have a full package ready.

Macedonia, Huit Points!

Finally that moment in 2015 arrives when the first countries grace the 2015 Eurovision stage for the very first time, we kick off this morning with Moldova, Armenia, Belgium and The Netherlands and then skip into the afternoon with Finland, Greece, Estonia and finishing the day but no means least Macedonia

We come at the rehearsals with some preconceptions as to what will be good, bad and indifferent as we have already seen performances from many of the delegates on the promo tour.....but forget all that WE WILL clear our small brains of all this and open a totally open mind and be as objective as we can

Just a few more hours and clips from www.eurovision.tv should be online plus opinions from the 5 million other bloggers about to unfurl their (sometimes brutal) honesty on the world