Niels Brinck presented Denmark with “Believe again”. His mother plays the saxophone, and he is only 17 when he writes his first song. His Eurovision piece has already become golden and platinum because of the huge number of internet downloads. “Besides our Sakis, this one is the best” said the Greek hosts- the Mangira sisters.

The four from the Quartissimo quartet are violin players from Slovenia. At first, they created the song “Love symphony” to be played by an orchestra, but a special remake and the addition of a singer- Martina Majerle- shaped the song in Eurovision format. A killer-combo!

Hungary was represented by Zoli Adok and “Dance with me”. Adok himself is a dancer and had written a dissertation on “how to avoid feeling pain on sage”. The performance looked a lot like aerobics demonstration and, as if with a time machine, we were brought back in the 80’s disco era- the time of the casual jumps and Sisi Catch hairstyles.  

For a second year in a row Azerbaijan took part in the competition, with the duet Aysel and Arash and “Forever”. Only sixteen, Aysel is already famous in her country. She lived in the US for quite a long period of time and when she returns to Azerbaijan, she joins the School of foreign languages, occupying herself with music, as well. Arash was born in Tehran and then, together with his parents, moved to Sweden where his career started.

The thirteenth appearance was that of the Greek star Sakis Rouvas with the hit “This is our night”. For Sakis this is a second Eurovision performance- he also participated in the 2004 Eurovision in Istanbul. Since then he has been trying out a lot of roles- of a singer, an actor, a host, and the more responsible of all- the one of a father. Sakis became a father of a baby-girl five months ago.

The Lithuanian Dmitry Shavrov began singing when he was twelve. Since then he has been a musician and, for the past few years, a professional one. He spent eight years in London studying music and after returning to his home country, he was chosen to perform “Love” at this year’s Eurovision.

The Moldovan candidate Nelly Ciobanu is much loved in her country. She has the gift of singing in 11 languages – from Russian to Korean. She has made four albums and has cooperated with many established and famous artists. She describes herself as a romantic and an optimist, which was shown in her happy mood when she presented her song “Hora di Moldova.”

Albania is among the most punctual countries in Eurovision. The country chose its representative back in December. The sixteen-year old Kejsi Tola, who won in the Music Idol competition, sang “carry me on your dreams”. The young singer says that she cannot decide between pop and classical music.

Estonia was represented by a female band with violin and cello players of ages between 16 and 20. The quartet is called “Urban symphony” and its song “Radajad” was one of the most remarkable in the competition. It is of interest that this year’s show hosted 13 violin performances.

Last for the night performed “The Toppers”, the Netherlands, whose band was created as a joke, in order to take part in a festival. However, they became very famous and have sold by now over 1.5 millions of CDs. They represented their country with the song “Shine”.

After the competition part was over the hosts announced that five countries go straight on the finals- France, Russia, Germany, Great Britain and Spain. The audience was also informed on the new way of showing the results- electronically. After fifteen minutes of voting, the results were announced and the Saturday finalists are: Azerbaijan, the Republic of Croatia, Ukraine, Lithuania, Albania, Moldavia, Denmark, Estonia, Norway and Greece.