Cyprus' Evridiki completed her second rehearsal in Hartwall this morning, in front of a gradually growing crowd of press and fans in the hall. She performed Comme ci, comme ça four times, looking intensely captivated by the music and receiving rapturous applause from the audience.
The team, like several other delegations, have been experimenting with backgrounds and light settings, and now Evridiki sings with her band in front of an overwhelming ornate blue stone-textured pattern. Although this is a little overpowering in the hall, it looks good on screen, and the electric colours suit the song's electronica vibe. The camera cuts and sweeping angles are giving the presentation a real wow factor.
A woman possessed
Evridiki herself is a vision in metallic silvers and black, against the moltern white and blue patterns. These halt suddenly for her raised microphone robot dance, and her jerky, robotic dance movements are a feature which run throughout the song, which Evridiki throws herself into, body and soul. At times, she looks crazed on screen, with intense, glaring expressions, but the effect is striking rather than disturbing – as if she is a woman taken over and controlled by the mechanics of the beat. It is a shocking, but ultimately very impressive performance. The presentation is self-consciously super-cool, and the frosty, machine colours only serve to accentuate this.
Evridiki missed the fist word of the lyrics in the performance until the last run, confirming how difficult it is to pull off a vocal start from zero. As the song still makes sense without the tous, it appeared at first that it would remain cut, but it popped up again at the beginning of the final run.
The crew managed four full runs altogether, and each one gained a good vocal reaction from the crowd, now filling out in the Hartwall Arena press enclosure.
Press Conference
The conference got underway fairly quickly and within moments Evridiki was asked about her feelings about the second rehearsal, 'It felt much better, the sound was perfect today'. Conversation moved to the song itself and Evridiki announced that she could not say if this was her best song ever, but it was certainly he best song in French.
Speaking of her 10 year old son, Evridiki told the assembled press that he would be arriving on Wednesday and had spent time reassuring his mother that everything at the conest would work out fine. Especially when the omen of the number came into the conversation 'I don't believe in things like this really but my life has been full of 3's lately. I am about to release my 13th album so it may be fate that I am singing in 3rd position'.
Talk moved to the promotional tour that Evridiki embarked on, taking in places including Russia, Belarus, Belgium and the United Kingdom. Thankfully the tour is helping with the pressure of performing in the Semi-Final, although the Cyrpus performers never had sencond thoughts when asked to perform for their country this year. 'We decided to go and enjoy ourselves and have fun and if everybody liked it and we were lucky enough we would get through'
Everyone was enjoying the atmosphere but unfortunately, the press conference had to come to an end and now all Evridiki can do is keep her fingers crossed for a top 10 finish Thursday the 10th of May.
CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE CYPRUS REHEARSAL PHOTO GALLERY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2jtfBm-Ujk
