In a few minutes, EMA, the Slovenian national final to decide the country's representative for the Eurovision Song Contest 2009 will start. 14 acts will compete for the golden ticket to Moscow. Among the competing artists, there are plenty of singers already well known in the world of Eurovision. Two of them, Omar Naber and Karmen Stavec have already represented Slovenia once, in 2005 and 2003, respectively. The invited interval acts of tonight's colourful show are Rebeka Dremelj, winner of last year's EMA, Slovenian pop singer Natalija Verboten, popular opera Slovenian opera singer Helena Blagne accompanied by four tenors, as well as Dima Bilan, winner of last year's Eurovision Song Contest.

The Slovenian national promises to be extremely exciting this year as the voting is totally unpredictable, especially due to the fact that- like in the Eurovision Song Contest 2009- the winner will be decided by 50% televoting and 50% jury voting. Contrary to previous editions, there will be no superfinal tonight. Both televoters and jury will allocate points to their favourites from 1- 12 in Eurovision style and the one with the most points will become the Slovenian representative in Moscow.Looking back at the history of EMA, it becomes evident that, whenever both televoting and jury voting were involved, the opinions were mostly highly controversial and the winners of televoting often failed to win due to the points from the jury. This element adds some extra tension to tonight’s outcome and makes it all the more unpredictable.

Webcast

Live webcast will be provided here

Participants

1) Lea Sirk – Znamenje iz sanj
2) Cuki – Mal naprej pa mal nazaj
3) Quartissimo – Love symphony
4) Omar Naber – I still carry on
5) Brigita Suler – Druga liga
6) Ne Me Jugat & Slavko Ivancic – Kaj me briga
7) Eva Cerne – Vse
8) Karmen Stavec – A zi zelis
9) Alya and Rudi – Zadnji dan
10) Bjonde – Blonde power
11) Samuel Lucas – Vse bi zate dal
12) Nexys – Vsaj za en den
13) Skupina Langa and Manca – Zaigraj muzikant
14) Nuska Drascek – Kako lepo

Live coverage

The show has just started. A stunning Rebeka Dremelj performs the first interval act and does a charming rendition of Vrag naj vzame, last year’s Slovenian winning song, dressed in black leather pants and a red top.
The audience gives a warm welcome to tonight’s host couple, Maja Martina Merljak and popular Slovenian Peter Poles, the man who was presenting the Slovenian votes for Eurovision numerous times, also in 2003 when his announcement of "Turkey 10 points" decided the victory for Sertab Erener.

1) Lea Sirk – Znamenje iz sanj

Current poll standing last with 0%

The opener is a rather low- key entry with R’nB- elements. Lea is one of last night’s eight qualifiers and performs in totally different way to yesterday, wearing a white dress and sitting in big black chair, which is placed in the centre of the stage, at the beginning. Lea looks confident but her song is not enough to make a big impact.

2) Cuki – Mal naprej pa mal nazaj

Current poll standing last with 0%

The first of the six prequalified acts invited by RTVSLO. A rather hilarious entry, the group sounds like a Big Band and is accompanied by two blond female dancers. Nice to watch but no competitor for victory.

3) Quartissimo – Love symphony

Curent poll standing 3rd with 17,8%

A song by Eurovision and EMA- veteran Andrej Babic from Croatia, the composer of Portugal 2008, Slovenia 2007, Bosnia and Herzegovina 2005 and Croatia 2003. For the Slovenian national final, Andrej has composed Metulj in 2005, performed by Sasa Lendero, Mandoline in 2006, performed again by Sasa Lendero and Cvet z juga in 2007, performed by Alenka Gotar (winner).
Quartissimo is a strings quartet, they are dressed in black suits, each one behind a life- sized frame (looking similar to Ani Lorak’s stage equipment in 2008), where they came out of after some seconds. As the song advances, the blond background vocal comes out as well. With Quartissimo, Andrej Babic has ventured another original experiment for sure. But how appropriate is it to send a mainly instrumental song which only contains a few moments with background vocals to a contest, where the music is playback and only the vocals are sung live, thus making the vocals even more important?

4) Omar Naber- I still carry on

Current poll standing 1st with 31,1%

Omar Naber is back and definitely one of the favourites to win tonight. As Omar exclusively revealed in his interview with esctoday.com, his song, the only of tonight’s entries to be performed in English instead of Slovenian, was written all by himself in 15 minutes by the seaside in the moment of weakness and is about some disloyal former friends who let him down after having shot to fame. The piano- and violin- driven song is rather melancholic but- as the title implies- also conveys the message to find the courage to stand tall in times of disappointment and despair, no matter how unbearable it gets.

Suitable for such a kind of song, the background is being kept rather dark and Omar appears in casual clothes, accompanied by four women dressed in black playing violins. Very strong vocals and professional vocals, Omar is a serious competitor!
Having represented Slovenia in 2005 with the dramatic rock ballad Stop, Omar could become the 2nd artist to have represented Slovenia at Eurovision twice, after Darja Svajger who represented her home country in 1995 and 1999. The time difference would also be the same: It’s four years after 2005 and Darja won again four years after her first victory.

5) Brigita Suler – Druga liga

Current poll standing 2nd with 26,7%

Brigita is accompanied by five backing singers, the performance looks similar to the one from Sasa Lendero in 2006 but it does suit Brigita’s song. Brigita’s clothes are in beige and gold. Although lacking a bit vocally and not as strong and original as with her highly dramatic and powerful 2008 song about the twisted godess Samara, Brigita is among the favourites with her ethno song Druga liga.
As Brigita explained in her interview with esctoday.com, Druga liga is about a guy who is not good enough for her and therefore considers him to be- as the title suggests- second league.

6) Ne Me Jugat & Slavko Ivancic – Kaj me briga

Current poll standing last with 0%

A very folkloristic tune (the intro starts similar to the Israeli song of 2007, Push the button, but leads to a totally different kind of song of course) but except for a nice melody, the song doesn’t lead anywhere.

7) Eva Cerne- Vse

Current poll standing 5th with 4,4%

Eva Cerne is hoping to be third time lucky tonight, as this is her third attempt to win EMA. In 2007, she managed to reach 2nd place (as wildcard after winning Bitka talentov, a talent show from RTVSLO) and last year she reached 5th spot. Eva’s song Vse sounds rather unspectacular with the distinct lack of a highlight throughout the song.

She is performing in an orange evening dress, accompanied by four male background dancers in black and if off- key most of the time. Eva might be favoured in the jury voting but it seems rather unlikely that Vse will get the most support of the televoters.

8) Karmen Stavec – A zi zelis

Current poll standing 6th with 3,3%

Karmen looks more beautiful than ever in her beige dress and with her sparkling earrings which look like they are from her store, Swarowski. The three backing vocals and two dancers are entirely in black, contrasting Karmen’s bright colours. Karmen’s performance is very professional and the song is in R’nB style, composed by Rafael Artesero who is no stranger to Eurovision being responsible for the Andorran entries in 2005 and 2006. As Karmen has revealed to esctoday.com, the song has an autobiographical meaning and is about a guy who left her girlfriend in a disgusting way and now wants to take everything back and make unforgivable things undone.

10) Bjonde – Blonde power

Current poll standing joint 8th with 2,2%

As the title implies, the song is performed by two blond singers, with two blond background singers and two guitar players with blond wigs. Both song and performance are deliberately kept in a very trashy way. Nevertheless, the song is also quite forgettable and unlikely to be the concept for success at Eurovision.

11) Samuel Lucas – Vse bi zate dal

Current poll standing joint 6th with 3,3%

Samuel Lucas is one of the six acts invited by RTVSLO thus already qualified to the final. His voice sounds interesting, the vocals are strong but is the song strong enough to stand out from all the others?

12) Nexys – Vsaj za en den

Current poll standing last with 0%

A rather nonchalant rock song. The blond lead singer’s vocals are quite solid and she is wearing wings which look exactly like the one that one of the Azerbaijani singers from 2008 was wearing, only in black colour instead of white. Unlikely to compete for first place.

13) Skupina Langa and Manca – Zaigraj muzikant

Current poll standing 4th with 6,7%

After Omar Naber, this is another act considered to be one of the favourites to win tonight’s show. The late starting position might help.

Skupina Langa is the group who gained 2nd place in last year’s EMA with Za svobodo divjega srca, only beaten by Rebeka Dremelj by less than 400 votes in the superfinal. Manca Spik, a Slovenian pop singer, also participated on last year’s EMA placing 9th with Se vedno nekaj cutim.
Langa and Manca have a highly ethnic, folkloristic song which, in case it wins tonight
might gain a lot of votes from the Balkan countries at Eurovision. The song is about “dancing one’s pain away”. In the chorus, the musicians sing a phrase in Russian language- Tanzuj, tanzuj, devuschka! (Dance, dance, girl!).

The composer of the song is successful Slovenian music producer Matjaz Vlasic who- for example- also composed Energy for Nusa Derenda in 2001, gaining 7th place, the best Slovenian result so far.
However, Zaigraj muzikant might come across a bit too obvious, trimmed to conform to specific stereotypes.

14) Nuska Drascek – Kako lepo

Current poll standing joint 8th with 2,2%

The last song of tonight’s show. Nuska has a rather catchy entry, sounding a bit orchestral. Pleasant but it is unlikely that it will compete for victory tonight, remaining rather insignificant like a lot of the other songs of tonight’s show.

All 14 acts of tonight’s final have now performed. It’s time to start the voting process. A recap of all performances is being shown and after that, it’s time for some more interval acts until the results are ready to be revealed.

Interval acts start again. Rebeka Dremelj and Natalija Verboten perform a rock song together, dressed in black.
Another interval act: Popular Slovenian opera singer Helena Blagne performs "Carruso" together with four tenors.
Now 2008 winner Dima Bilan is performing his winning song Believe, as always, lying on the floor at the beginning, dressed in black with quite long hair, accompanied by a violin player in the background. And now follows Number 1 fan, another hit sng of Dima's. It is soon time for the results.

And the winnes are Quartissimo with Love Symphony.