Tonight the Azerbaijani national selection for the Eurovision Song Contest 2010 will kick off with the semi final being held. Six acts will compete for three spots in the national final.

The show

The show to be broadcast in ITV will start at 17:00 CET (20:00 local time) and it will be hosted at the Buta Palaca in Baku. Six acts will perform one song each and a jury will select three of them to compete in the national final, which is expected to be held at the end of February. However, the televised national selection is primarly a performer selection as the song performed by the winner might well be replaced by another entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 2010.

How to watch?

A webcast will be made available here.

ITV is availbale on satellite at Hotbird (Frequency: 10971 (H), SR: 27500, FEC: 3/4).

Participants

As mentioned above, the songs are preliminary and the winning song may be replaced after the national final.

Composer/Lyricist in brackets.

1. Azad Shabanov – Smile
   (Zahra Badalbeyli, Vusal Garayev)
2. Milk & Kisses – I am on fire
   (Dilara Kazimova, Farida Nelson, D.J. LOOPer)
3. Maryam Shabanova – I've had enough
   (Maryam Shabanova)
4. Safura Alizadeh – Soz ver
   (Gunel Musayeva, Zahra Badalbeyli, Elvin Musayev)
5. Elli Mishiyeva – Up, up
   (Isa Malikov, Paulina Malikova, Elli Mishiyeva)
6. Ulviyya Rahimova – In love
   (Ulviyya Rahimova, Sergey Guliyev)

In 2009, Azerbaijan was represented by Asel & Arash, who finished second in the second semi final and third in the grand final with their song Always.