Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

Eurovision related artists keep releasing new songs and this time we have Nikki Ponte's Remembering summer nights , her follow up to her Greek Eurovision wannabe I don't wanna dance . Scooter already teamed up with Matia Bazar's Antonella Ruggiero in Ti sento and now Vicky Leandros gets the treatment with L'amour est bleu aka C'est bleu . Another Eurovision winner Dana International visits Subliminal in their Alay . Aurela Gce teamed with MC Kresha earlier this year in Ca$h with its rather futuristic video. Not bad, all four of them!

Poland started the second round of technical rehearsals. Magdalena and her team were wearing the outfits for the real thing and unfortunately they are rather horrible vision of white and silver. Vocally she wasn't in top form today either and with that drops in my list from a possible finalist back to non-finalist. Stella from Norway lit up her smile today and it makes all the difference. The song is fun and happy and will surely get the whole arena dancing and singing along. Will it make people also vote for it? I think it does and Norway's in the final. Like Poland there are no visible changes to the set or the choreography.  Aurela from Albania has also changed to her outfit and it's the one seen on the video with the matching very blue make up.  She's vocally as stunning as always really not holding back but giving it all even if this is just a rehearsal and there's the biggest danger: she's on the edge of overdoing it going over dramatic. But I think Alb...

So, the first day of rehearsals is over. They might be "only" technical but already give hints what to expect how things will turn out later. This first part of the first semifinal turned out to be a solid pack and when five songs were presented I had five possible or sure qualifiers. Disturbing! Of course it's not going to be like that when tomorrow we have another nine songs to go through ( btw, tomorrow I can't be blogging until the evening so tomorrow's comments and posts will all come together, not as the day progresses ) and the things may look a bit clearer - or then not.  The biggest positive surprise today was maybe Albania . I didn't count much on it but it did make an impact. I was also very relieved Finland did look stunning and sounded as good as I hoped it would. Way to go Axel! I have to admit Armenia gave a good show without being over the top and as much as I wished it would be a disaster it's a contender. Not for the victory but for a g...

If the first two entries were rather simple dance & sing performances Albania pulls out all the tricks: there's smoke, there are countless pyros until the whole stage is on fire and above it all a huge eagle is spreading its wings and one wonders when will it take flight and sweep Aurela away? Aurela herself is in great vocal shape as we could expect and definately there is no drama missing. I thought Albania might be overshadowed by the previous two uptempo numbers and get lost but now I think people will stop Haba habaing around one minute mark of Albania's entry and just stare in silence.... Is Albania forcing itself to the final again after all? Check it out here on AKOE. She has three backing singers, a drummer and a guitarist on stage with her. And most likely she will be wearing the same dress she has on the video. Here's the official video. 

Croatia - Daria Kinzer - Celebrate **** This one went from Lahor by Jacques Houdek to Daria to Break a leg and finally Celebrate . I think I liked a bit more the original softer Lahor/Break a leg version. I didn't go crazy for this one at first but it has grown to be one of my favourites, a good mood old fashioned Eurovision entry. But as I have said before it's will battle it out with Hungary and may lose. Qualifier: With a lot of luck. Albania - Aurela Gaçe - Feel the passion ** Albania often reworks its songs so much you hardly recognise them anymore after the work out but this time Feel the passion and Kenga ime sound pretty much the same only underlining the fact the English version has lost the feeling of the song. To me it sounds pretty boring now and the stars went down. Aurela though will propably give all on stage and judging the preview video will look stunning. Will it be enough to bring it to the final? Maybe not. Qualifier: Will struggle .  Belarus - Anas...

Albania has presented its entry in English with a fancy video to go with it. This time around the song hasn't been completely overdone and rearranged but sounds pretty much the same as before. Here .

Aurela Gaçe (36) has won the 49th Festivali i Këngës and therefor will represant the country in Eurovision 2011. This is her third win but in 1999 and 2001 Albania didn't yet participate in Eurovision. Her song is Kënga ime .