Malcolm Lincoln took to the stage at about 11am Oslo time to get his first rehearsal under way. Onlookers were treated to what will be one of the quirkiest stage shows of the contest.
Malcolm is joined on stage by a pianist and four backing singers called Manpower 4. Malcolm is wearing a black (or dark navy) velvet smoking jacket and grey pants. Manpower four have similar outfits, as does the pianist. Malcolm also wears a colouful scarf. It looks as if the costumes are the ones they will wear on the night.
The lighting for the song is simple but effective. They’ve gone with the national colours of Estonia, just like last year. It starts out with two strips of blue light on the top and bottom of the backdrop. Then we see a square of white light twinkling in the background. At different stages white light radiates out from the centre, all the way to either edge of the backdrop.
The camera work was very good on this one. There are a lot of spinning shots with Malcolm, in fact, there’s one after another at one stage. Malcom failed to hit the right camera a few times but that’s what the rehearsals are for.
One camera shot needs to be changed though. During the instrumental section Malcolm does a weird little dance and the overhead camera shot isn’t capturing it properly.
That said, the overhead shot shows the beauty of the stage. The mirror under the glass floor makes it look like it’s a never-ending pit, a well-lit pit, though.
This was a very smooth rehearsal and the Estonians seem happy. The whole thing looks polished and very, very quirky. Malcolm may win a few votes for that but he might suffer from coming after Russia who also have a slow song/ballad.
