Hungary's Magdi Rusza took her turn on stage this afternoon, at her final individual rehearsal in the Hartwall Arena. She continues to turn in a professional, heartfelt performances.

The hall fills with blues and autumnal, dusky yellows for Magdi's performance, and she now appears without the headscarf, in a white vest top and black trousers as she drags her suitcase sadly onto the stage. Yellow leaves fall resignedly behind her as she launches into her moving blues performance.

Wonderfully soulful
As expected, there is nothing too dynamic in the camera shots for this song, but instead the focus is on long, slow pans and close-ups on Magdi's amazingly expressive face. On the screen, all this underpins a wonderfully soulful performance, which may not excite everyone, but should impress the blues fans at home.

• You can find the photo gallery here

PRESS CONFERENCE

Magdi's press conference begins with journalists talking about her concert last night in Helsinki. Magdi and her band performed in an Irish pub for fans who were very impressed especially with a Hungarian language song she sings called Lonely stranger. Magdi explained she sings the song because it reminds her of arriving alone in Budapest when she first set out to follow her dream of singing. Concert goers were also taken with a Serbian song she sang to promote understanding between people. Magdi grew up in the Serbian province of Vojvodina as part of the Hungarian minority there, so when she came to Budapest she was already a stranger in another country.

Why did Magdi leave her career as a maternity nurse to enter the Hungarian talent search Megasztars? "To tell the truth, I was unemployed," Magdi answers bluntly.

The Hungarian Head of Delegation is called upon to talk about Hungary's sporadic Song Contest attendance. She also give a straight-forward answer, "Its a financial matter for the company," but she continues, "We realise that this is a political arena not just an artist's arena, so we will try to participate in years to come."

What can Magdi say about the Hungarian music scene? "I'm told there's a trend toward commerialisation – but I am not an expert on this. I prefer rock and rock bands. But I wouldn't like to make a pronouncements on this".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OeHltNgdQ3Y