UPD – 2 17. Showing some leg: Sabrina rehearses

by Richard West-Soley 187 views

Sabrina and her troupe of Latin dancers performed in full costume this morning, Sabrina dressed for the part in a leggy black number.

Sabrina is all legs on stage as she twirls in a tiny black dress studded with shining diamonds. The female dancers appear in black trousers and waistcoats, with white long-sleeved shirts, apart from the central one who wears silver.

Focus on dance
There are enthusiastic whoops from the audience after each of her performances, which comes across on screen as a sea of swirling reds. The camera angles glide in and around the performers on stage, mimicking the waving reds of the background graphics. Much is made of the male-female dance routine on the camera, alternating between the female principle and Sabrina herself, who both take their turns with the only man on stage. There are some lovely close-ups of Sabrina, especially when the song switches language to French, Spanish and English.

Sabrina is as charming as ever, turning in a cheerful, vocally sound performance.

Portugal’s second rehearsal

Sabrina greeted the press and fans with a broad smile and Moi Suomi, mitä kuuluu? and of course got a loud applause. There were a lot of press and fans present and it looks like Portugal is gaining popularity rapidly in Helsinki.She and her team were very satisfied with their second rehearsal saying it went much better than the first one, especially the dancing and choreography.

She was asked if she plans to tour the Europe if her song becomes a summer hit after the contest and she answered nothing is planned yet but of course she would be happy to. First she must record her first album though.

A question about the song’s style followed and Sabrina said she likes her song a lot and is the kind of music she likes to perform before adding she will be happy just to sing, any kind of music. Right after she was asked to sing some fado and she gave it a try but stopped after few notes and promised to rehearse some first.After that Sabrina told she likes to sing all sort of music. Especially Latin pop and Portuguese music. She also prefers to sing in Portuguese and right after delivered a wonderful accapella version of Lusitana paixao, Portugal’s entry in 1991 to the joy of the people present and via screens in the media centre..

The inevitable came in the form of the question about the fact that Portugal now is the country participating for the longest time without winning after the Finnish victory last year. Does Sabrina think Festival do cancao is the right way to select the entry? Are the Portuguese people looking for a song that could win the Eurovision or just a song they like? Her answer was that their song this year is good and she is very happy to perform it and their goal is to bring Portugal to the final. If they manage in that they are happy.Another tricky question followed in the end: What does she think of the Norwegian entry? “I don’t think I know that one” she said before breaking into laughter. Then she told that of course she has heard the song but didn’t comment any further.

The press conference ended as usual with a bit of a chaos autographs, photos and promotional material.

  • You can find the photo gallery here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUC6-xYtDl8