Second Semi-Final -reactions after perfomance

The representatives of nineteen countries have presented their songs tonight in the Second Semi-Final of the 2008 Eurovision Song Contest.

Watch the reactions after perfomance below:

The ten qualifiers of the second semifinal

The following countries have qualified for the Final of the 2008 Eurovision Song Contest (in order of announcement):



Ukraine
Croatia
Albania
Iceland
Georgia
Denmark
Sweden
Latvia
Turkey
Portugal

Portugal rehearsal and press conference

Vânia Fernandes has everything what is needed to succeed in the contest nowadays: a touching, melancholic song performed with utter professionalism! The charismatic Portuguese singer gave several faultless performances today, using the gigantic stage to great effect with dark-blue and green projections on the LED-screen.



Press conference

In her press conference Vânia expressed her happiness about being in Belgrade. When asked about the lyrics of the song, the composer, Carlos Coelho, explained that it's funded upon a historical poem and Vânia added that it is a very emotional song for her and that it is about her native country, Portugal. The Portuguese team explained that they went on promotional tour to Bulgaria and Malta. When asked if Vânia has plans for an album, she asked that she would like to start working on one.



sources: eurovision.tv; esckaz.com

Dulce Pontes in concert in Spain

esctoday.com reports:

The town of Jerez de la Frontera, situated in Andalusia (Southern Spain), is to host a concert in which Dulce Pontes will present her new album. The Portuguese representative in Eurovision 1991 will show her excellent vocal skills on August 23rd.

O Coração Tem Três Portas is the name of the brand new album of Dulce Pontes. The Portuguese artist returns to fado and traditional folklore in her latest CD, after having explored other musical genres in the meantime.

EDC Portugal: Sónia Araújo's life and hopes

Sónia Araújo and Ricardo Silva are the dancers chosen by the Portuguese public broadcaster to represent RTP in London at the first Eurovision Dance Contest.

Sónia spoke to esctoday.com and talked about her background as a dancer, her work as a TV-host and the preparations for EDC. Due to agenda issues, Ricardo Silva couldn't be present. He is at the moment competing at the German Open Championship.

You can read Sónia's full interview here




source:esctoday.com

“Gelosia" with Sónia Araújo

oikotimes.com reports:

Sónia Araújo, Portuguese “Vip” representing Portugal in Eurovision Dance Contest, will join the stage with other TV-hosts and artists in the end of July. “Gelosia” is the name of the show, a kind of “Dancing with the stars” held in Lisbon (S. Jorge Theatre) next 27, 28 and 29 July.

The show is produced by the choreographer Marco de Camillis, the same producing Sónia in Eurovision Dance Contest. Eight professional dancers and eight stars will dance together different styles, like Tango, Jive, Rock n’ Roll or Funky. Just after this show, Sónia Araújo begins her trainings to Dance Contest with her couple, Ricardo Silva.

Portugal dance styles for EDC revealed

esctoday.com reports:

Sónia Araújo alongside Ricardo Silva will be the dancing duo who will represent Portugal at the first edition of Eurovision Dance Contest. The dance styles to be performed on stage will be jive on the first choreography and tango on the freestyle section as Sonja revealed to Luís André Florindo for esctoday.com.

Sónia and Ricardo will intensify the preparations for the contest at the end of the month of July and work throughout August. All aspects of the act will be considered and mostly the technical moves. Sónia considers that her biggest challenge will be following all the rules and trying not to do any faux-pas.

She feels confident and a bit anxious. "It's a great responsibility to represent Portugal at such a big event and even greater if it is the first time. I will do my best to make people proud and to be at the level of the other contests, many of whom are professionals", said Sónia Araújo to ESCtoday.

The musical arrangements will be done by Fernando Martins, an experienced musical producer. The music first dance routine is still being discussed. The music for the tango will by a piece by "tango virtuoso" Astor Piazzolla to which will be added the sound of the portuguese guitar and a percusion instrument called "adufe". This will add the flavour of portuguese fado and folklore to the performance.

Sónia Araújo while hosting the morning show on RTP will also present on the show, in the coming weeks, some dancing routines with a group of dancers she created.

source:esctoday.com

Dulce Pontes to perform at New Seven Wonders Ceremony

from esctoday.com

About 2,200 years later, the world is about to know what the New Seven Wonders are in a massive ceremony broadcast to the whole world on July 7 from Lisbon. Among the guests that will perform on stage there will be Dulce Pontes, who represented Portugal at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1991.

Stepping on the Estadio da Luz stage will be world renowned personalities of show business like "songstress" Jennifer Lopez, dancer Joaquin Cortés, Holywood Oscar winning actors Hillary Swank and Ben Kingsley, football star Cristiano Ronaldo and opera singer Jose Carreras. The latter has worked in the past in a duet with Dulce Pontes. They will do the opening number of the show with a song called Todos somos um composed and written by Dulce. The song is the hymn of the event and will be performed in Portuguese, English and Spanish.

Read more on esctoday.com

Dulce Pontes concert in Bulgaria dedicated to Portuguese EU Presidency

Sofia Echo reports:

Portuguese fado singer Dulce Pontes will stage a concert in Bulgaria on July 11 2007.

The event will be held at 8pm in Hall 1 of Sofia’s National Palace of Culture. It is dedicated to the Portuguese presidency of the EU, which started on July 1 2007 and will last until December 31 2007.

Pontes is famous songwriter and singer who performs various music styles, including pop, folk and classical music. She is often considered among the main contributors to the revival of Portuguese urban folk music called fado.

Pontes reaches eighth place in Eurovision song contest in 1991. She recorded duets with world famous Andrea Bocelli, Jose Carreras and Cesaria Evora. Pontes also recorded an album with Ennio Morricone.

She features among the most famous and respected Portuguese artists.

Portuguese fans want to speak Serbian

from oikotimes.com

In order to prepare the Portuguese fans trip to Eurovision Song Contest in Belgrade, a group of Portuguese fans is organizing a course of Serbian. The inscriptions are already passing. According to OGAE Portugal, the lessons will begin in September.

In 2006 and 2007, the Portuguese fans also organized Greek's and Finnish courses, with a great adherence.

For more information, please contact ogae.portugal@netc.pt.

Sonia Araujo and Ricardo Silva for Eurovision Dance Contest

Sónia Araújo, who is the hostess of an RTP morning TV show, will be joined by Ricardo, a participant of the Dança Comigo show. Ricardo together with his partner Tânia Seixas rank 5th in Portugal and 368th in the world.

The Portuguese entry will be choreographed by Marco de Camillis and the two themes that will be presented in London- one latin and one more portuguese- will be composed by Fernando Martins.

Luciana Abreu, Portuguese Eurovision entry in 2005 as member of 2B, wins last evening the third edition of “Strictly Come Dancing” (in Portugal “Dança Comigo”). Luciana is now very popular in Portugal especially because she has the leading role in a teenage daily soup-opera called “Floribela”, where she plays a young singer.

sources:esctoday.com;oikotimes.com

Portugal announces rules for Junior

from oikotimes.com

The Portuguese broadcaster will repeat last year’s formula for Junior Eurovision Song Contest.

Yesterday, RTP put online the rules for the national selection. As oikotimes.com reported earlier, all the kids between 10 and 15 years old have two months to write and compose original songs and send it to RTP.

Then, a jury will select the 12 songs that will be performed in the live festival.

Portugal participated last year for the first time in Eurovision Junior, with the 14th year old boy Pedro Madeira.

Sabrina - Portugal Semifinal Night - VIDEO

Eurovision Helsinki 2007 - Semi-Final - Portugal - Sabrina

Sabrina prepares summer concerts and new CD

from oikotimes.com

The 2007 Portuguese Eurovision entrant is preparing her summer tour.

Sabrina proudly represented Portugal in the Helsinki 2007 Eurovision edition and reached the 11th place in the semifinal, only four points to qualify to the final.

“It was amazing and fantastic my adventure in Eurovision! I’ll never forget everything what happened to me”, told the singer to oikotimes.com. In her concerts, she will perform not only her Eurovision song, but also other Portuguese entries from the past. “It’s my way to say to everybody that now I’m a Eurovision fan too!”

This afternoon, Sabrina sang and performed “Dança Comigo” in the most viewed afternoon TV-show, titled “Contacto” (SIC Channel). Next weeks, she will perform in many summer festivities all over the country, just before recording her debut CD. The track number is not confirmed yet. For sure, her Eurovision song will be included.

Portugal chose the choreographer and composer for Dance Contest

The choreographer of the Portuguese entry will be Marco de Camillis, an Italian choreographer responsible for the program “Strictly Come Dancing” (in Portugal “Dança Comigo”).

On the other hand, Fernando Martins will compose the two songs – one Latin style and a Portuguese-Ethnic. Fernando Martins, as author and producer, reached the second place of 2007 Portuguese national selection to Eurovision Song Contest with the song “Ai de quem nunca cantou” sang by Teresa Radamanto.

Sónia Araújo's couple was not revealed yet, but, according to José Poiares, head of delegation, “he is a professional dancer as sure”.

source:oikotimes.com

Euro HIT 40 -June

Demonstrating once again just how some musical styles no longer have any boundaries, two countries at this year's song contest (the 52nd, as it happens, and held in Helsinki) quite independently chose similar songs with similar titles. Unfortunately, neither song managed to obtain enough popular support to make it through from the semi-final to the final of the competition on Saturday, 12 May.

Scandinavian Latin
The first of these Eurovision songs comes from Norway, and - as the Latin music makes you anticipate - has a Spanish title, although the bulk of the lyric is in English. Ven a bailar conmigo (Come and dance with me) was performed at the contest by Norwegian actress and singer star Guri Schanke. After the viewing public voted, her song came in 18th out of 28, with only the top ten songs going through to the final.

Lusitanian Latin
The second Latin song came from a Latin nation, Portugal, though it too had more of a Spanish feel than anything else. Sung by newcomer Sabrina, Dança comigo (Dance with me) fared better than the song from Norway, coming in 11th and just missing a place in the Eurovision final.

Heard on stations all over the world, the Euro Hit 40 is Europe's No.1 chart show.

source:radionetherlands.nl