Over the past year, the editorial team has been brainstorming ideas about how to make our features stronger and better and after tossing them around, we come up with a proposal. A couple of months ago, ESCflashmalta ran the feature 'An Expert Opinion' for the Malta Eurovision Song Contest with some acts not handling the criticism well but this time round, we have sought some of the best people in the global music industry to review the songs in this years' Eurovision Song Contest.

The expert reviewers chosen have been very warm and have managed to seek both positive and negative aspects. The level of professionalism is guaranteed with some of them even being full time judges for talent having been A&R's amongst other things. Today, we are introducing the names that will be reviewing the entries in the second semi-final submitted for the biggest musical event in Europe known as the Eurovision Song Contest which this year is set to take place in Dusseldorf, Germany. These set of reviewers will start off their verdicts after the entries in the first semi-final are ready.

The second semi-final of this years' Eurovision Song Contest will be featuring a total of nineteen (19) entries and will be taking place on the 12th May 2011. Many fans of the event believe that this is a semi-final which could be touted as relatively open with only some one to two countries looking as certain qualifiers. The draw plays a very important role in this case when there is no stand out song. We would like all of the countries competing in this show the very best of luck.

Semi-Final 2 Experts:

01. Michelle Farrugia

Two strong names in this semi-final made it quite difficult to find someone else to join them but we decided to call upon a woman who has been making a name of herself in the country of Australian where she was born. Despite having Maltese heritage from her fathers’ side, she has opted in living in the nation where she was born and developing her music there. In fact, although she is not signed to a recording label, she has a musician who produces her material and could therefore be touted as an indie type of artist working on a number of pop/ballad type of songs with some hints of rock at times.

In recent weeks, ESCflashmalta has interviewed the woman who is currently quite busy working on her debut collection of songs which will be released in an album, in fact, the re-launching of her website along with the recent photo shoot continue to see her establishing herself as an artist. Her connection with the Maltese Islands grew stronger in 2001 when submitted a song into the Malta Song for Europe competition which made it through to the final stages. She was quite surprised to have been accepted into the local music scene and took it in her stride to make sure that she gives a sublime performance.

Michelle and her singing ability were given importance through a number of vocal studies which took place at the Victorian College of the Arts which is a prestigious University in Melbourne. There she managed to complete a Bachelor of Music in Classical Voice and Opera. At this point in time her musical taste developed even more bringing a diverse mix of artists to her ear from Maria Callas to Eva Cassidy, Barbra Streisand, Carol King, Whitney Huston, Joss Stone, Tina Arena, Aretha Franklin and many, many more. Michelle also enjoys an array of musical styles from Soul, Opera, Jazz, Lied, Blues, French Song, Folk, English Song, Rock but most of all her love for a rich lyrical ballad has never been surpassed.

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02. Tobias Larsson

Over time, we have been managing to get in touch with people from all over Europe and one of the most interesting people I met whilst writing about the Eurovision Song Contest is none other than the Swede, Tobias Larsson, a man who has the Eurovision Song Contest close to his heart apart from working within the business on quite a number of occasions. Last year, he joined our esteemed panel of experts on ESCMALTA where he was a leading head judge for the Malta Eurosong competition. This year, we have called upon his expertise in the entertainment industry to watch, listen and analyze the songs in the second semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest.

Searching for a new career, Tobias Larsson left Sweden pursuing his dream in becoming a media figure in neighbouring country of Finland. There he has become one of the notable names in Finnish Television where has been commentating on the Eurovision Song Contest for the Swedish based audience of the broadcaster, YLE. Apart from this job which he did for two consecutive years in 2009 and 2010, he was also the man behind the Swedish based website of the same aforementioned broadcaster back in 2007 when he had just starting working with them as an Editor managing to rack up both presenting and writing skills making him a true media man who can inter-change between jobs.

At the present moment, despite Eurovision not being his main line of focus, he has been given a promotion and is presenting a talk show on Radio Vega which also falls under the YLE category. From Monday to Thursday, he alongside three other presenters discuss a number of issues within the country and the world in general. One could note that it is quite different that what he used to do but such a challenge might prove to be very important within his career. Still, he has been following the event for quite some time and intends to continue and that is why, his opinion, as a former commentator and radio host is highly valued.

03. Steve Allen

Taking centre stage with a bright spotlight set up on him is none other than our head judge, a man who influence in the music scene can also never gone by unrecognised. As seen in the first semi-final with regards to Charlie Rapino, we have called upon one of his best friends, the sensational Steve Allen who started off his career in the music industry as an artist, managing to have a hit record with the song “Letter From My Heart” released in 1984. Despite the fact that he was making a name for himself as an artist, he quickly liked being the man behind the scenes and thus established himself as such within the next couple of years.

In fact, despite ending his career as an artist in 1991, he took his first behind the scenes job in 1993, when he became the Head of A&R at Warner Music Group where amongst other things, he managed to work with some of the worlds’ leading artists including Dannii Minogue and Eiffel 65 amongst others but the connection with the Eurovision Song Contest is quite strong having been the producer behind the British entries at the event in 1996 when the Australian Gina G represented her country with ‘Ooh Aah... Just a Little Bit’ finishing in a very respective sixth place and also in 1997 when Katrina and the Waves went on to win the event with the song ‘Love Shine a Light’. After ten years as the Director of A&R at the Warner Music Group, he went onto become the Director of his very own Rushmore Recordings as well as developing Steve Allen Music Ltd, both of which he still very much owns.

Still, despite opening up an independent music label and producing music for artists which he has signed onto his label, he took up some work with two major labels, becoming an A&R for Sony Music BMG in January 2006 ending his tenure just one year and four months later in May 2007, doing quite a good job with a number of acts whilst also being connected with the national pre-selection for the United Kingdom having produced the song ‘I’ll Leave My Heart’ for French singer Cyndi who was the runner-up that year despite being a firm favourite of Europeans. For a short period after that, something like a year and five months he re-joined the A&R team at Warner Music but now works independently with his main act being Vanessa Contenay-Quinones who was quite the star back in the 90’s and is now re-inventing herself.

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The preparations of the Serbian entry for this years' Eurovision Song Contest seem to be in full swing actually with Nina and her song 'Caroban' getting the final setup ready to take on the event in the best possible way. The song which will be performed in the second semi-final on the 12th May 2011 will be aided by three backing vocals instead of a choreography keeping the song as simple as possible but many will be quite startled to see who has been chosen.

The Serbian broadcaster, RTS, in connection with the composer and the main artist have chosen Sanja Bogosavljević, Aleksandra Janković and Tijana Bogićević to join Nina. Now, for those that have no clue who they are, Sanja was a backing vocal for Marija Šerifović during the 2007 Eurovision Song Contest and a member of the popular group Beauty Queens, Aleksandra was a backing vocal for Milan last year in Norway and Tijana had taken part in the last Beovizija back in 2009, showing a truly impressive range.

Speaking about the performance, the producer and the choreographer stated that it will "be in a 1960s style theme" going onto add "I hope the Eurovision audience will like the song and that we will make it into the final. I believe in my song and myself. I’m not nervous and I can’t wait to appear on stage”. Everyone is seeing Serbia as one of the underdogs this year and I believe that this will be one to look out for because it will surely surprise on the night.

Source: RTS

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When it was announced that Dana International would return to the Eurovision Song Contest, people across Europe began to get excited for the return of the Diva. Today a revamped version of Dana’s song has been released. This version will be the official version sung by Dana for Israel at this year’s contest from Dusseldorf, Germany.

Did you know that the song in fact is written by Miss International herself? The song won the right to represent Israel at Eurovision Song Contest, by winning the annual Kdam contest in Tel Aviv earlier this month. It was also announced today that remixes and alternate versions of the song are to be released following the release of the revamped version. They should be out in the next couple of days.

As reported by ESCflashmalta yesterday, it has also been revealed that Jean Paul Gautier has offered Dana any of his new dress’s for the contest. Gautier is said to be a big fan of Dana International. He even designer the jacket she won for her winners reprise when she won the contest back in 1998. It will actually be the 12th year anniversary of her win on the week of eurovision itself this year. Could this be an omen for victory?

Source: IBA

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One of the nations with a little bit less problems to worry about is none other than Spain having secured their place within the final of the annual Eurovision Song Contest by virtue of being one of the top five financial contributors of the event along with the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Italy. This year, the country which has influenced the pop and latin charts for so long bring us a song which could be said to be traditionally Spanish sung by the ever so charming Lucia Perez.

The singer is currently promoting her song 'Que Mi Quiten Lo Bailao' all over Europe with her first destination being Zurich in Switzerland and the second being London in the United Kingdom. It is somewhat vital for the artist to visit the Spanish communities in these countries as she believes that she owes it to them to note their culture in a more important factor. She will not be doing a lot of promotion other than those two countries but it seems she will be going to Germany early to visit the many Spanish people within the nation.

Despite not being fully supportive of the song, she has grown to like it and before leaving for her first promotional trip, she was practicing the choreography for the Eurovision Song Contest and remarked that she is delighted with the way that things are moving forward and that she is learning quite a lot from the team that has appointed to join her. In other news, she has quite a good spirit about the event itself because she believes that her style is somewhat unique this year whilst the position within the running order is a definitive aid.

She has already heard a number of songs for this years' event by her favourites are up till now are those of France, Belgium, Iceland and Austria which mark the typical ballad tick apart from Belgium which is somewhat a poppy/vocal type of flavour.  We would like to wish Lucia and Spain the very best of luck in the 2011 Eurovision Song Contest taking place in Dusseldorf, Germany and encourage you to listen to the song below.

We have just also been notified by the Spanish broadcaster, TVE, that Lucia will be joined by five backing dancers who will most probably be doing some backing vocals as well. These are none other than Cristina Domínguez, Sandra Borrego, Amaury Reinoso, Ginés Cano and Juan Francisco Solsona. The choreography has been described in a very interesting fashion 'contagious, spectacular and full of happiness'

Source: Eurovision Spain

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