We are seeing the first rehearsal of the 18 songs in semi final 1 and this is the 10 songs I think will qualify.
01 – Russia
02 – Hungary
03 – Cyprus
04 – Iceland
05 – Austria
06 – Croatia
07 – Netherlands
08 – Malta
09 – Greece
10 – Czech republic
We are seeing the first rehearsal of the 18 songs in semi final 1 and this is the 10 songs I think will qualify.
01 – Russia
02 – Hungary
03 – Cyprus
04 – Iceland
05 – Austria
06 – Croatia
07 – Netherlands
08 – Malta
09 – Greece
10 – Czech republic

It has been a busy few days in the world of Eurovision. Starting with the theme for the 2016 contest which is Come Together. We have had songs selected in Malta and Belarus. Also, Hungary began their selection process and Lithuania continued with their qualification programmes.
Malta – The 2002 representative for Malta, Ira Losco, will once again represent her country at Eurovision. Ira won with Chameleon (Invincible). There was a semi-final of 20 songs and 14 songs took part in the final.
Belarus – Ivan will represent Belarus after winning the national selection with Help You Fly. Ivan beat off competition from nine other acts.
Hungary – The national selection of Hungary (A Dal) began and the first six acts to qualify for the next stage are Freddie, Benji, Mushu, Egy Másik Zenekar, Reni Tolvai (all by jury) and ByTheWay (televote).
Lithuania – 12 acts competed in the next phase and the following acts progressed Ieva Zasimauskaitė, Baiba, E.G.O. ,Berta Timinskaitė, Neringa Šiaudikytė, 4 Roses, Saulenė Chlevickaitė, Milda Martinkėnaitė, Ruslanas Kirilkinas, Aistė Pilvelytė
Ukraine: The national final will be on 21 February with two semi-finals preceding on 6 February and 13 February.
Poland: A national final has been confirmed for 5 March.
Source: www.eurovision.tv

Hungary has confirmed the 30 acts participating in the 2016 edition of the national selection for Eurovision – A Dal.
The final will be on 27 February with three quarter finals and two semi-finals preceding. Some previous national final acts are taking part again including the group Passed and the 2014 Hungarian representative Kállay Saunders.
Source: www.eurovision.tv; www.esccovers.com
Every year I do rate the P R of each each country from a press perspective (seen out of my own eyes mostly) but also taking into account that I hear from others and then give them a point of out 10
Every year some countries SHINE and others are just awful. 2015 was no exception. I have decided to do this in order of appearance via semi final 1 and 2 and then those automatically in the final
SERBIA
I had very little to do with the press people as the president of OGAE Serbia brought me the promo CD with several language versions. As the week went on, many more copies seemed to be given to mindividuls.
8 out of 10
HUNGARY
It was quite easy and I was not neccessary to wait for Tamas arrival to help me. I got the promo CD easily and the whole delegation was nice and friendly.
8.5 out of 10
BELARUS
A huge disappointment, having had always fantastic relations with them, especially in 2009 in Moscow when the head of press, every time she saw me put another gift in my hands, this was such a low point for me. I had for exampled asked no less than TEN times if we could get a t-shirt of Belarus to give to someone to wear at the fanstand – it was the most beautiful t-shirt with the lyrics, yet although they kept saying yes, it never came. I was told no promo CD but a UB stick that looked like a watch. had it not been for Pavel, I would have had nothing. I know why this change but will rather keep quiet on it.
2 out of 10
RUSSIA
A first difficult, In got postcards and t-shirts but they have run out of CD’s by the time they got to my pigeonhole nunber 1576. I had to write to the Swedish composers and CEO’s of the publishing company and then I got the CD for me. Most of these people came especially to say hallo to me at the fan stand and I was able to hand Jasmyn’s cover of the song. I do understand that the Russian people in the delegation were not as clued up to my involvement as the Swedish group. Luckily it all ended well.
8 out of 10
DENMARK
Horror after horror after horror, three years in a row now. Just absolutely nothing and they seem to live by the name of the group “Anti social media”. The chances are slim that I ever will be involved in an Afrikaans cover of a Danish euro song. I wish could give minus points.
0 out of 10
ALBANIA
They made up for last year and I quickly got the CD and DVD.
9 out of 10
ROMANIA
For many years, Romania has been among the top 5 when it comes to my experience with them and 2015 was not exception, so much so that I wore a Romanian T-shirt one day at the fan stand and also the lead singer and his little son came to chat to me when they walked on the red carpet. The song has also jumped into my rankings to number 6.
10 out of 10
GEORGIA
I also have close relations with Georgia, especially when they have a Thomas Gson song and I got the CD almost immediately. I also got gift bags and t-shirts which I were able to hand to other fans. We also took a photo of Georgian head of delegation coming to vote at the fan stand.
10 out of 10

Vienna State Opera and ORF will host a grand gala concert “Pop meets Opera” only two days before the Eurovision Song Contest semi-finals on 17 May 2015.
The opportunity is a great honour and acknowledgement for Boggie as only five ESC singers and Austrian representative Conchita Wurst is invited to perform at the concert.
Placido Domingo and Juan Diego Florez will also sing at the gala and a joint surprise performance will also be presented to the audience.
Boggie’s performance will also be extraordinary as she will sing her song “Wars for Nothing” together with the children’s choir of the Vienna State Opera.
“After receiving the invitation from the Austrian organizers I was extremely happy and proud at the same time. I could not believe this is all happening to me. It was not even in my wildest dreams to stand on the same stage as Placido Domingo… Whatever happens in Vienna, I will be forever grateful to fate for this gift.”
Áron Sebestyén (co-author of “Wars for Nothing”) will accompany Boggie on piano in the Vienna State Opera where she will perform in a wonderful Elysian dress besides the singers of Armenia, Ireland, Cyprus and Norway.
The gala will be broadcast live on ORF.
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