Rehearsal

Serhat takes the stage for his 2nd rehearsal. Maybe this grew up on me, but it looked and sounded more endearing. The team with Serhat on stage is very professional, both the dancers and the backing singers. The video art is upgraded with more elements being added to it, including on the LED floor. Letters are flowing in pink and the video art really makes the stage looks huge. When Serhat counting down in Turkish, the words in Turkish appear on the screen. It's nice to see it since Turkey has a long Eurovision heritage, and we all miss it. With all that being said, I don't see a lot of chances of this qualifying to the final.

Greece is opening this long day of rehearsals. The camera goes from the backing vocalists/dancers, to Katerine, and to the audience. It helps the performance flow, and it seems the stage director really got the essence of the song. I understand people who claim it's a bit kitschy, however, this one works, and as I said before it walks on a thin line, but make sure not to cross it. Katerine was very good vocally. There's a point where she does a high falsetto, which needs to be worked on, cause it doesn't sound quite right yet.

Conan Osiris 2nd performance seems to be a tad more engaging. It seems there are more movement and energy, with Osiris himself takes on a few delicate moves. The green outfits and the red video art remained the same, with a black terrace like frame. Conan sounds great, just like in every performance he gives. Unfortunately, this still seems to be a borderline qualifier...

VIctor Crone getting on stage for his 2nd rehearsal. The Swedish singer, who represents Estonia is delivering his Pop-Dance track "Storm". His vocals are not the strongest and he missed the queue once or twice... The virtual storm actually worked this time and Victor performed with the pre-recorded part, in which he's seen in it. It's much like what we saw in the national final. The rest of the video art is as we saw in the first rehearsal, and I'm afraid it's not impressive.

Hatari's 2nd rehearsal! The Icelandic hopefuls are back with their hateful song. Klemens improved vocally, but still, need to step his game up a bit. Matthías is on point as always. More or less the same performance as it was in the first rehearsal. A grey version of Matthías' head appears at the last part of the song, with thorns or spears coming out of him. There are also smoke coming up from across the stage.

Australia's performance is much like the first one. Kate slays the vocals and the camera work serves the song well. The video art creates a 3d feel to the performance. The press is impressed (...), but I'll say it all looks a bit too circusy to me. Kids will love it...

Oto Nemsadze was very impressive in his first rehearsal. He comes back on stage for the 2nd rehearsal for his dramatic "Keep on Going". Everything stays more or less the same as in the first rehearsal. It's a very lyrical performance with the Georgian mountains in the background, a river and a bridge on the LED floor and barbed wire across the video art. Fire, lightning and a lot of national pride. There's a handshake at the hand on the video art that I assume portrays the bond of Georgian and Abkhazian people.

Eliot is back now for his 2nd rehearsal. What has been changed since the first one? Not much. Performance is solid, with Eliot wearing a blue jacket with red ends. The two drummers now wear shirts with two red V signs on them. Video art shows red lines, vertical and horizontal. Smoke erupts towards the end of the song. I must say something with the song doesn't connect to the performance.

Nevena goes on another great vocal live. The backing is in gold and blue; the video art shows swirl of those two colors, both in the background and on the LED floor. There's a use of augmented reality if I caught this right, where the swirl surrounds her.

ZANA has changed her outfit. She wears a crop top in pink, white and black, shorty white shorts and high boots. She has a matching a jacket, that is being taken off by the dancers early in the performance, but it's not done in the most elegant way. The two female backing singers also changed outfit and wearing urban outfits in black, white and red. The dancers wearing short sleeve top in black with what seems to be some tribal shape in white in the middle. ZANA seems to keep her vocals for later.