The third annual esctoday.com awards are currently being held. While you can still cast your votes until 23rd December, we will take a closer look on the nominees and the categories every day in random order. Part one is dedicated to the Best male performance category.

History

This award will be given out for the third time. In 2006, it went to the runner-up in the competition, Dima Bilan from Russia. Last year, Koldun from Russia was the winner having finished 6th in Helsinki. The complete results of 2006 and 2007 were as follows:

2006

1. Dima Bilan (Russia)- 32%
2. Mihai Traistariu (Romania) – 30%
3. Hari Mata Hari (Bosnia & Herzegovina) – 18%
4. An�ej De�an(Slovenia) – 13%
5. Brian Kennedy (Ireland) – 9%

2007

1. Koldun (Belarus) – 33%
2. Roger Cicero (Germany) – 27%
3. Kenan Doğulu(Turkey) – 16%
4. Eiríkur Hauksson (Iceland) – 15%
5. Hayko (Armenia) – 9%

2008 awards

The following acts are nominated this year:

1. Dima Bilan of Russia for Belive
2. Boaz Mauda of Israel for The fire in your eyes
3. Laka of Bosnia & Herzegovina for Pokušaj
4. Simon Mathew of Denmark for All night long
5. Sébastien Tellier of France for Divine

Click here to watch the videos of the nominees!

Dima Bilan is the first Eurovision Song Contest winner who is nominated in this category, which is no surprise considering that he is the first male soloist winning in 18 years. He is also the only singer nominated for the second time in this category. His stage performance of Believe was probably one of the most expensive ones in Belgrade and included professional ice-dancer Evgeni Plushenko and violinist Edvin Marton. Of course, his semi-striptease and his barefoot performance were well dicussed during the Eurovision week.

The performance by Boaz Mauda of Israel was mostly focussing on the vocals. On stage, he was surrounded by his five backing singers Adam Yosef, Ariel Zohar,Eran Mazor Hecht, Lior AshkenaziandZach Eshel giving the ballad, which was composed by 1998 Eurovision Song Contest winner Dana International, a hymnal atmosphere. All of them were dressed in grey, silver and black making it one of more gloomy performances of the evening.

Those who expected a spectacular performance by Laka from Bosnia & Herzegovina were probably not disappointed: on stage he was accompanied by his rather eccentric sister Mirela Laković, who was doing her laundry,and four knitting brides. To those who did not understand the song and performance, the singer explained it as follows: "What I am trying to say is man did not came from monkey, he came from love. So stop acting like a monkey, globally speaking- stick to love."

Simon Mathew from Denmark is the fourth act nominated in this category. The singer, who is a former talent contest participant just like Dima Bilan and Boaz Mauda, and his band dressed appropriately for the presentantion of the wittingly nostalgic song. He repeated his succesful performance from the Danish national selection, where he was an early favourite with the bookmakers depsite having to perform at the unlucky third spot in the semi final and even more unlucky second spot in the final.

Divine by Sébastien Tellier caused an uproar in France being the first French entry mostly performed in English. His stage performance in Belgrade was also one of the more eccentric ones and featured his five female backing singers wearing fake beards, a beach buggy and a beach ball (obviously reflecting the tune, which referredto the music of the Beach Boys). The camera work was heavily critisised but probablyit was an essential part of the overall performance.

• Click here to vote in this and the other 19 categories now

REGISTER AS AN ESCTODAY.COM MEMBER

To vote, you must be a registered esctoday.com member. Membership is free and allows you to vote in our online polls, react to articles and enter all competitions on the website. As a member, you can also subscribe to our newsletter. Click here to register.