Rehearsals Day 1

It seems all go in Helsinki as today the semi-finalists began rehearsals! One minor change was that Estonia was rehearsing instead of Iceland cos Eirikur Hauksson was busy apparantly, hopefully getting his haircut. Nevertheless, I've been reading loads about the acts today and seen little video snippets too, but before I comment, here are three things I'd like to say...

- The stage is awesome
- The sound quality actually sounds good
- The stage is really awesome

Yup, the stage with its ability to morph into anything you want thanks to those massive and crystal clear screens is looking to be the best stage ever! But what of the 14 countries today? Well...

• I've slagged off Bulgaria a lot but it looks and sounds pretty good. The stage is dark blue with lightning bolts which really suits the song and her singing, which could've sounded awful live, is alright! Maybe I should watch this one closer. I still don't think it's got that appeal though.
• Israel's stage looked super - a blue neon skyline and globe. Their rehearsal apparantly went well and is the stuff of Eurovision novelty songs of years past. Novelty dancing, lots of shouting, sounds like it could do well.
• Evridiki's back for Cyprus with guitarist and drummer on a red stage. The instrumental bit in the middle will allow us to see Evridiki in slow motion which sounds very exciting. Luckily she can still sing 15 years on. It looks like the semi's got a strong opening set of three.
• Belarus has a lot of trickery with walls in which the backing dancers seem to mould themselves into. It starts with a trick with Koldun appearing from behind the screens and ends with a firework. From the video, it doesn't look like he was straining himself and there were some very dodgy notes so I hear. Hmm, mixed reviews on that.
• Estonia is alright. Nothing special. But we knew that.
• She's dumped the blancmange! Sopho from Georgia is sounding good but looks like she's doing some very bizarre choreography, reminiscent of hopping. Her backing dancers also have swords! Maybe they misheard, 'Sailing through my sword-y'. They also broke the stage in true Ruslana fashion - an omen perhaps? Still, it's not bad but may be too shouty.
• Montenegro is supposedly a bit stationery, and Stevan Faddy sounded a bit off at some points on the video I saw. Close but no banana so I hear.
• The anticipated vampires from Switzerland! Bobo and Co's vocal abilities have been criticised and praised. They sounded OK on the video I listened to, but maybe the frantic choreography is putting them off. Some say it will qualify, some say it's missing something. One thing's for sure, I was confused when the photo appeared to show about 12 people on stage, but apparently, there are dummies around the stage. Lord knows why.
• Moldova has a fiddler and three dancers doing things with red handkerchiefs, no doubt dumped by Ledina Celo two years ago. More pyros here on a red stage, she's giving a good vocal performance, this really could be a dark horse but I'm still unconvinced.
• Netherlands performance is like the song - good, but ordinary. There's a podium involved, lots of dancers, but not much spark. She is singing as good as in 1998 though, so there's a bonus! Eddy's admitted that she's singing in English cos she wants more points! Someone should've pointed out that this hasn't worked for the UK of late.
• Albania all looks a bit static - even the backing singers have microphones! But there does seem to be a fiddler on his knees so there's obviously high drama here. Water is on the backdrop for this.
• DQ has not let Denmark down. A very camp performance which starts with him in a black cloak before revealing a very short pink sequinned dress! Lots of dancing, lots of pink and a massive crown onstage behind him. Vocally OK I hear, I think this could qualify!
• Croatia is apparantly very stilted, but no surprise there. Boring song, boring performance!
• Poland involves a lot of moving. Firstly, our singer is trapped in a cage before being released and entering into a lot of moody business with chairs! It all sounds good fun to complement the song nicely, but I'm still not convinced it's a qualifier.

Well, after day one, plenty of mixed reactions! I think the best overall reaction seemed to go to Cyprus as there were critics of the favourites Belarus and Switzerland. I think the only really poor rehearsal seemed to be Croatia and Albania - too static - but this might change. This next batch of songs rehearse on Saturday.

Tomorrow, Serbia-Latvia!