Eurovision 2016 Rehearsals: Day 2

/ Sekhmet Morgan

eurovision sweden 2016Eurovision 2016 – With two weeks to go to the contest, daily rehearsals start today and of course the Eurovision Times will do its best to cover them; here’s for the first rehearsals to the second half of semifinal 1: pics and vids will be officially released and we get to discuss, debate, analyze, predict…

So this is how it’ll work for the next 10 days or so: we will resume the system from last year. This is, there’s an article for the day’s rehearsals published the morning (or night before, knowing myself) with the calendar, which you can also find on the official site here. You can comment all day on it, based on all the info you can gather around and as soon as I can, I’ll get working on a recap article with links to pictures, videos, etc. However, I do work and have busy weeks at work ahead of me so I’ll do that at the latest in the evening, sooner if possible, depending. Usually, the girls are down there and as you know, this year ET did not get a pass, so they’ll be following from here and will help publishing any news article.

So we’re all counting on you guys to post in the comment section all the links you find and discuss all material out there. Hope it works out great for everyone, and already a big cheers to all the sites who will post their own made materials (Esckaz, Escxtra, Escinsight and the infamous Esctoday come to mind).

Here’s tomorrow’s schedule: Semifinal 1 – Half 2 & Sweden – First rehearsal

There will therefore be 10 countries getting their first taste of the stage and first impression from it.

As usual, in first go, countries rarely reveal everything from their staging, definitely not the clothes. But the fans get an idea of what direction the performance is heading towards. Usually, the official site publishes photo sets from rehearsals and a short clip (around 90 seconds) about the artist’s impressions around 40 minutes later. Last year it was not possible for any fan sites to record anything else, so you’ll have to just read what everyone there thought about it without seeing more with your own eyes (and of course hear with your own ears).

271 thoughts on “Eurovision 2016 Rehearsals: Day 2”

  1. I missed everything today, but your comments helped me catching up. From the tiny bits that I saw, Gabriela is standing (out) more and more, so to speak. The rest went more or less according to what I was expecting; the biggest surprise came from Samra, who can’t sing live, if one believes what several fans wrote. Malta wint for yet another elaborate stage preseZZZZzzzzZZZZ; Cyprus is trying desperately to look ‘hard rock’; Montenegro’s guys did their thing; Iceland is losing steam; B&H is gaining momentum; Austria is finally tiring some with all that sugar; Estonia stepped up its game, but I must say I prefer the NF stage presentation (the jury is still out on that one); Sweden is only about the koochie-koo factor and it seems to be working for many.

  2. Countries expected to qualify from semi 1 according to the betting odds after everyone rehearsed :

    1.Russia
    2.Armenia
    3.Malta
    4. Czech Republic (climbing)
    5. Netherlands (climbing)
    6. Cyprus
    7. Azerbaijan (falling)
    8. Croatia
    9. Hungary
    10. Iceland

    IMO Estonia cannot possibly miss the final and also Bosnia and Greece will be in..to whose expense ? Probably Iceland for sure and then Cyprus and..dare I say Azerbaijan ? It will be a bloodbath.

  3. From what I saw

    1. Iceland – Great song and good staging! Yes there are some similarities with Swedish winning acts but still I like it.
    2. Czech Republic – Fine vocals, modest show, okish song. They could find better dress though.
    3. Estonia – The same thing what I said for Czech Republic. Juri reminds me of Mr. Ripley and I like it.
    4. MONTENEGRO – Just what I expected. I’m not surprised and not dissapointed.
    5. Cyprus – I wouldn’t miss those cages on the stage. I would replace those cages with long hairs for the vocalist. Aslo the stage presence of the guys is not that great from what I saw.
    6. BOSNIA & HERZEGOVINA – Actually I didn’t like the gimmicks but that wasn’t enough to make judgemets.
    7. Azerbaijan – Bland soulless song, weak vocals….
    8. Malta – My guilty “torture” of the season
    9.Austria – An abysmal show that destroys quite nice song.

  4. Rehearsals Day 2

    Czech Republic-She looks very sleek on the stage,the dress is simple but I like seeing the reflection of colors on it.

    Austria-I definitely don’t like her “high school prom night” look..what were they thinking?

    Cyprus-The stage reminded me of Turkey 2011,I hope their fate will be different because I like the song

    Estonia-The coolest guy of the contest is on stage…but the suit….a hand-me-down from his grandpa????His NF costume was a lot better…loving the backdrop

    Azerbaijan-Samra is in casual clothes…No matter what she wears she will look drop dead gorgeous on screen…I would ditch the dancers and let her sing alone just like in the video..she needs to overcome vocal issues asap

    Montenegro-They do look and sound different than anyoneelse in this semi.I am really curious about their faith

    Iceland-That outfit with all those long straps is not good for tiny ladies like her…it looks funny on her…I like the song but not as much as I did before

    BiH-Barbed wire,a blanket…really? This is the tackiest gimmick so far…I love the song and really want them to qualify but it doesnt seem very likely

    Malta-I read that she wears her ugly shapeless coat till the end of the song…Shame!The dancer is pointless and adding nothing to the song.What I see is pretty disappointing

    Sweden-he is in casual clothes…I think his final look will be the same.It’s OK!The song is nothing special..I don’t get all the fuss tbh

  5. Oh and my ranking for today :

    1. Estonia – Everything falls in place properly.
    2. Czech Republic – Top notch minus dress.
    3. Sweden – Simplicity, charm, contemporary song.
    4. Austria – toned down visuals and great vocals.
    5. Iceland – does what it has to do properly.

    And for the other 5 rehearsals..I can’t really rank them, they were all ranging from mediocre to bad. Apart from the revelation the CZR not many positive surprises today.

  6. Gabriela seems to be gathering support, but I still think that the voting patterns will harm her chances. She is a borderline qualifier, imo. Azerbaijan will most probably qualify, even if Samra ruins it live.

    • So apparently according to the press corps who was there, Czechia and Austria had the two best rehearsals of the day with Malta among the worst. Amongst all the clutter of comments, that’s good to know.

      As for my own personal impressions, I still haven’t seen any video apart from those very unhelpful snippets. I’ve seen pictures and read the comments of journalists. Austria has gone for the Wizard of Oz treatment, full with yelow brick road and rainbow at the end, so we know who is doing the LGBT theme this year.

      I have only read good comments about Cyprus’ performance from the people who were there. However the cage concept looks like a mental asylum to me, I can’t say I like how it looks in the photos. How Cyprus will do stuck in between the two most feminine entries this year is also a question mark.

      Gabriella oozes class, but frankly the song is too much of a cliche, pedestrian ballad for me to warm to it. I wish they had qualified last year when they deserved it more. This year she will probably take the place of a worthier song.

      A lot of candidates for the Barbara Dex today, from Bosnia’s thermo blankets (what are they thinking?), to Greta’s regrettable insistence on that shredded piece of nonsense to Malta’s two equally ugly and unbecoming outfits. I should probably add Juri with that suit, the glasses that need to go and the lame card trick.

      Really difficult to make any prediction at the moment so I will let the dust settle and wait for the full rehearsal videos (which can be quite deceiving as well since you don’t see the various camera angles). However I am keeping in mind that the only bloc of countries that comes out in force in this semi is the central-european one (Hungary, Croatia, Czechia, Austria and in the case of Austria, France as well) so these countries will probably have less trouble qualifying than people think. The ex-soviets have five countries and at least four of them will break for Sergey, but we know that two of them will not vote for each other. Still Armenia can additionally count on France, Holland, Greece and Cyprus. In terms of obvious support I can only see Malta counting on Sweden (no UK or Ireland in this semi) so perhaps it will be harder for her to qualify than we think?

      • I supposed you noticed though that Czech Rep. had double the votes of Austria whose staging is the recreation of their official video and i don’t really like it so far.

        • Gabriella is also benefitting from the fact that she is an unknown quantity who has done no lives before from a country that has never qualified. So people in the ESC circuit are more likely to be impressed and even get carried away if she does well. A little mystery always does wonders. However I doubt all this will mean much to the viewers the night of the final. To the public they are all equally unknown. What will matter to them is that she is a poised, beautiful lady who sings well.

          If we take these votes at face value she will win the whole thing, since she is ahead in the journalists’ vote count compared to both Iveta and Sergey. So I think there is definitely a little exaggeration there. But there is no doubt that Czechia and Austria are the two entries that people in the press corps liked more from what they saw today. The value of this ranking is only relative, but if I were Juri and Ira I would be worried.

  10. I think I can skip tomorrow’s rehearsals 😁

    10:00: Latvia
    10:40: Poland
    11:20: Switzerland
    12:00: Israel
    LUNCH
    13:40: Belarus
    14:20: Serbia
    15.00: Ireland
    BREAK
    16:00: FYR Macedonia
    16:40: Lithuania
    17:20: Australia

  12. What a bland day this was. Estonia being the biggest disappointment. They are totally ruining fine song. No energy Cyprus was a big let down too.
    Montenegro was a very pleasant surprise, but not as big as Armenia yesterday. I might get hit by that Yerevanian LoveWave after all.
    Over all meh, I’m afraid.

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    indeed as that lovely shiny ballad amongst the rest! between me and here, among peninsula ESC fans group, we are still out there! without smiley!

  17. Off topic: Ukraine wasn’t popular at all with NDR’s “experts” … *cough*
    I fear that the German jury (which of course is strictly pop) will think likewise.

    #getridofjuries

  19. Bingo! here in Spain we love Portugal and Portuguese songs and vive verca, thus we miss each other in ESC and in terms of voting I guess too! bem bom hey!

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