All countries

At the Moscow Eurovision party organizers have produced 3D copies of all participants of the party, which have been handled to them yesterday at the red carpet. For example you can see that in our report with Macedonian entant Daniel Kajmakoski.

Good morning!

Yesterday there were four parties in Vienna: Nordic, Serbian, San Marino and Montenegro. And I visited the last one.

So what can I tell about it? First it started at 19.00 and the way there from press center took just 15 minutes. It's not so far, just 6 stations by metro. The party took place in small and very cute club SPARK.

Perticipant from Montenegro met all guests at the entrance. A bit later after all guests came he performed his Eurovision song together with backing vocalists. After backing vocalists were singing Maria Sherifivich's song MOLLITVA.

Gosh doesn't time fly quickly.

Three days in and the first rehearsals are already over for the candidates of semi final one. From today, it's the turn of the remaining 17 contestants appearing in the second semi final.

In all fairness, those who thought the first rehearsals would give a better indication on who would qualify or not, think again, it's still a very wide open race. Yes Russia and Greece jumped out the best so far, but at this point anything can still happen.

It's proving to be a spectacular first semi final, so the expectations for an equally good show are high.

Bring it on the rehearsals!

If you're just getting up today, why not to check our daily review with ESCKAZ's Andy, Dimi and Alexandra and specially invited Melodifestivalen expert Jevgenijs. There was unanimous and somewhat surprising winner of our review panel this day.

Wellt he day went super well until the interview and meet and greet chaos started after lunchtime, at this point I lost complete track of the rehearsals going on the screen and missed almost all of them.

That said I did catch glimpses in between running from the press conference area, the interview rooms and the desk to upload it all and actually managing to get 2 or 3 interviews done

So.......

Finland, basically the national final repeated, still not a fan of the song at all....but that's just personal taste. However the guys really came to life a bit at their press conference for me.....like them a to now.....they are down to earth and hope they do well now!!

Greece....amazing performance from Maria-Elena for probably the best ballad in the competition this year....interview to come later this week, which I am really looking forward as she's a real doll!

Estonia....well I am sadly disappointed with this to be honest, vocally this was not really great today, but again this is a rehearsal, so hopefully this will improve by the time of their second rehearsal on Thursday.

Macedonia, again I was a little disappointed with this so hopefully this will improve for next time when the second run through.

That's really all there is from today.....

So we've had the first eight countries today, and let me tell you, it's still very very wide open.
Some countries still have some work to do while others are at this stage impressive already.

Winners for me today:

Greece - stood out with an absolute mile
Estonia - Great staging which reminds of the Netherlands but is still very authentic in its own right.
Moldova - Great opener to the show. Sexy, Flirtatious and impressive having to dance and sing at such high energy.

Tomorrow we meet the remaining semi one participants.

And I can't wait to find out what they have in store for us.

So here we are, all ready and set up for another fantastic experience at the Eurovision Song contest.

For the second year in a row, I'm back for the ESCKAZ team and totally excited to get you all the scoops in the ESC bubble.

This year, is a different year, the compeitition field is strong, and wide open. And that's how I like it. Just like last year, I'm convinced we're going for another surprise winner. Austria has welcomed us with open arms. A huge press centre's awaiting us with great facilities. So has the reception of the volunteers been, and the humongous press pack we've received. No expense has been saved, from free travel for press to the magnificent stage.

Austria has wanted the contest to return for so long, and now that it has, the whole city and organisation are embracing in the Eurovision sphere, which is only going to build bigger over the next two weeks.

In a couple of minutes time, the first of 40 nations are showing their cards for the first time, and just like them, we're ready to play our favourite game of the year.

Let the Eurovision Song Contest Begin!

Hi everyone!

Yesterday we visited Eurovision history bridge on the Danube river. There are all winners from 1956 there. And the most important question is... WHO WILL BECOME THE 60TH WINNER OF THE EUROVISION SONG CONTEST?

This video is in Russian.