Today the second rehearsals of the first semi final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2016 took place at the Globen arena in Stockholm, Sweden. This morning six countries had their second run through.
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Contents
Finland: Sandhja – Sing It Away
Sandhja starts in the middle of the stage in her powder blue cat suit, with large hoop ear-rings and a silver necklace and big black boots. Her nose ring and arm tattoo are quite prominent.
The lighting is blue with hues of purple thrown in at intermittent moments
The song is a feel good catchy opening number and Sandhja is joined by five female backing singers all in black, by the first chorus. There were a few missed notes in the chorus, but that could be put down to the nervousness of being the opening act. There is plenty gyrating taking place.
At the bridge of the song Sandhja walks down the runway and ends up ascending the stairs of the satellite platform to end the song.
Greece: Argo – Utopian Land
One of the male members wearing a white shirt and tan pants playing a lyre is the opening shot of the Greek entry before cutting to the women, Christina Lachana and Maria Elbrus with the opening wail. The female singers appear both dressed in Greek-like white costumes and the men are all dressed in white shirts and tan trousers.
The yellow and red lights on the back wall and stage floor give the impression of the rising sun mentioned in the lyrics The singing is impressive and the men rap centre stage. A drummer is also featured.
During the song the singers all join hands and dance along to the song. There are some technical faults during the third rehearsal. At the end of the song the group form a circle behind the dancer, Vassilis Roxenos closing moves. There is nothing wrong with the performance, will be interesting to see if Greece can keep its 100 percent qualification record.
Moldova: Lidia Isac – Falling Stars
This is a real disco stomper on stage, Lidia starts in darkness facing left in what looks like a sparkly dress but when the lights come on, it turns out to be black with blue tile like trimmings. The background is again blue, this years favourite colour.
Lidia stands centre stage singing the song.
A spaceman arrives to dance at the second verse, which Lidia sings in French. He continues to dance around her while she sings.Spotlights continue to flash off and on in the background. There are light blue lights illuminated on the floor.
Hungary: Freddie – Pioneer
Freddie’s stage performance is very similar to when he won the A Dal. Dressed today in a brown leather jacket and ripped jeans , it is unlikely that is his stage costume as the backing singers also had on jeans and black T-Shirts.
The stage floor is a refreshing orange marble colour with yellow spotlights towards the back. To Freddie’s left his drummer bangs the drums and dances away.He apperas to be wearing the monk like costume that he will wear on semi final night. During the first rehearsal the backing singers do not have the illuminated sticks that they bang together. The second rehearsal was much the same with the backing singers clapping their hands along to the beat. Freddie only did two run throughs unlike the others who have performed three times each.
Freddie has now confirmed that he and his backing singers will be wearing the clothes you see in the video below as they want to just be themselves on stage.
Croatia: Nina Kraljić – Lighthouse
Definitely a contender for costume of the year. The enormous silvery grey dress with black twig like features is certainly an eye catcher and she looks like a bird about to take flight. It is hard to imagine anyone will have a weirder costume.
However after the first chorus, four creepy monk like figures in black hoodies arrive on stage and remove the first costume to reveal another equally unusual. This time its a white and silver feathery thing and by this time its hard to remember that Nina has already sung two verses.
Nina stands mainly center stage without any movement just singing the song.
At the last chorus though, Nina steps up the vocals and the horrors of the dress are forgotten. Unexpectedly Nina walks off stage rather than raising her wings and flying away.
The Netherlands: Douwe Bob – Slow Down
Douwe is dressed in a dark blue suit and white shirt. There is a clock on the stage floor with a black middle and the outer rim is yellow. Douwe stands between the numbers strumming his guitar and is accompanied by a piano player, a drummer and two other guitarists.The clock is actually on the satellite stage to give a more intimate performance.
There was a very long delay between rehearsals for Douwe and there now appears to be an hour break before the rehearsals of Armenia, San Marino, Russia, Czech Republic, Cyprus and Austria.
