Danny (11.15)

And a very good morning to you all! The sun may not be shining as much here today in Malmö as it has been the past few days, but you can definitely tell that Eurovision fever is rising more and more as we get ever closer to the big event!

Today saw the opening of the press centre in a building called Malmö Mässan, a building situated adjacent to the Arena down in the south of the city. There was a fairly long queue to get into the press centre, but that’s always to be expected on the first day. The press centre itself is a large airy room with plenty of desks. Unlike previous years however, there doesn’t seem to be any laptops for use – just as well we brought our own. There’s a large water station and everyone was given their own bottle to fill up – there’s free tea and coffee but there’s no free food that we’ve seen so far!

Last night we were at our first official party of the season, at the San Marino party in EuroClub where we were treated to a 40 minute set from Valentina Monetta who had brought her own band from San Marino, and she proved herself to be an excellent and passionate performer. She even did a jazz version of both her Eurovision entries!

Afterwards, we popped into the main EuroClub room where some of the artists were there, including Moran from Israel, Lozano from Macedonia and Farid from Azerbaijan who was particularly popular with the fans!

Martin (11:45)
While Danny was busy at the San Marino party, a bunch of us went to the Euro Fan Cafe to check out the latest in the series of “talk show” events. This time Zlata Ognevich from Ukraine was the guest, and for all her English was (as she herself confessed) far from perfect, she proved to be really quite charming and relaxed. Her live performance of “Gravity” to the assembled audience came across far better than in the heavily choreographed stage version – simpler is often better! – and she even found time to gather her backing vocalists to demonstrate their warm-up techniques for us:

We’re really enjoying this series of informal events at the Fan Cafe – it’s a good alternative to simply rocking up to EuroClub every night, and the artists seem to be appreciating it too.

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Danny (12.15)

There seems to be rather a few technical problems here in the press centre. Not only is there no sound coming from the main screens, but there is a HUGE issue with the wifi – I managed to log on fine but some of the later arrivals couldn’t get on and have had to get dongles. Not ideal by any means whatsover. Normally, these issues always occur but the fact the press centre opened later than usual, and on the busiest day of rehearsals so far has meant there are a few stressed faces around!

Danny (14.30)

Lunch today was a bit chaotic, they have a nice food place here in the press centre, but unfortunately for me there was quite limited vegetarian options, so I popped outside to Emporia to grab some food and ended up at Max – Sweden’s very own version of McDonalds. Yesterday was a public holiday in Sweden so all the kids were off school today too, which meant it was VERY busy, and I missed the first run through of Croatia but got back in time for the other two.

Despite it being a little chilly in the press centre it’s quite nice in here, it’s very spacious and there’s also a nice seating area with chairs and sofas for people to relax in – even those with fan accreditation can sit there and if you tilt your head to the right angle you can just about make out the screens to see what’s happening on stage. The sound isn’t very loud though, even for those of us who are sitting right next to them! I do miss the sunshine we had streaming through the windows in Baku.

We’ve been having some more Wi-Fi issues, it’s been down for about half an hour now, and keeps coming back on intermittently. Fingers crossed they manage to sort it out!+

Felix (19:36)

Long day in the – finally opened – press centre!

For each rehearsing country today, I have been running to the arena to take some photos from the rehearsals, and back to the press centre to upload them. It’s quite a walk, I’m sure I’ll lose half a kilo for each rehearsal.

We just have a break here, before the rehearsals go on with Cyprus – which gives me the time to share this video with you!

Walk from the press centre into the arena

And indeed, it’s very chilly in the press area… fingers crossed that noone of us and our mates and partners from escnation get a cold!