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© BBC
21:30 CET, Your country needs you! 2010
Live: National final in the United Kingdom
How to watch?
The show will be broadcast live on BBC One, starting at 20:30 local time (21:30 CET).
- An official webcast is available for residents of the United Kingdom here.
Participants
All six acts will sing a cover version of a famous song. Then, the jury will choose three of them to go through the second round, where they will perform the UK's 2010 Eurovision entry, composed by Mr. Pete Waterman. The winner will be decided via televote.
- Alexis
- Esma
- Josh
- Karen
- Miss Fitz
- Uni 5
Your opinion
An online poll will be launched on esctoday.com when the three qualifiers for the second round are known.
LIVE
The show has started with a video featuring last year's UK's national final and participation at the Eurovision Song Contest.
The host of the show, Grahan Norton, welcomes the audience. A video presenting the composer of this year's UK Eurovision entry, Pete Waterman, is being shown. The author is now on stage talking to Graham about the challenge that Eurovision is.
Jade Ewen, the 2009 Eurovision representative, is now talking about her experience. Pete Waterman, Jade Ewen and Bruno Tonioli will be tonight's judges.
Time for the performances!
1. Karen
Karen is performing a song by Kylie Minogue. She looks quite confident on stage, showing off her powerful vocal skills. She is accompanied by four female dancers, whose dancing routine seems to suit this song. Karen has been tipped as one of the hot favourites to win the British ticket to Oslo. The juror Pete Waterman praises her performances, as well as Jade and Bruno, with some advice should she qualify for the second round.
2. Alexis
Alexis surprises the audience with the song Never gonna give you up, by Rick Astley. No doubt, he is taking a challenge tonight. The guy is delivering a charming performance on stage, and his appearance helps him quite a lot. Alexis is joined on stage by five backing dancers -male and female- whose dancing routine seems a bit bonkers. The overall impression is quite remarkable. Both the public and the panelists warmly welcome Alexis' performance.
3. Uni5
Uni5 is a group of -obviously- five boys and girls hailing from different parts of the United Kingdom. Their style seems quite 'dance', as they deliver the most catchy performance of the night so far. They are alone on stage, without any backing dancers. The crowd seems to be quite happy with the Uni5 performance, as they cheer and applaud now and then. Their voices are quite well combined, creating an overall good impression. Pete Waterman seems not to like this performance, while Bruno points out some of their weaknesses.
4. Esma
The youngest act of the night is next up. The girl is performing one of Donna Summer's hits. She said in her presentation video that being the youngest in the race to represent the UK in Oslo wouldn't prevent her from showing what she is capable of, and no doubt she is proving a great artist. Her vocals are quite in tune, although the dancing routine does not add up to her performance. All three memebers of the jury praise her performance, being called "diva in the making" by Bruno. Esma seems to become one of the favourites to qualify for the next round. Will she?
5. Josh
Josh appears on stage alone, but soon is joined by four female backing dancers. Josh's vocals are quite good, and he proves it delivering a flawless vocal peformance. Nevertheless, the guy should train his dancing abilities, as he looks quite static. The overall impression is quite convincing, and so think the members of the jury.
6. Miss Fitz
Miss Fitz is an all-girl band formed by three Londoners. They have said in their presentation video that they want to enjoy themselves on stage. And they have chosen a song that allows them to do it: Better the devil you know, by Kylie Minogue. Their performance looks fresh, confident and catchy, which should help them achieve a good result tonight. Pete Waterman points out that sometimes the girls were out of tune, something they have to polish.
This concludes the individual performances of the first round. Now all 6 acts are performing together an ABBA medley.
Pete Waterman announces the three qualifiers for the second round:
- Esma
- Alexis
- Josh
These three acts will compete at the second round of the 2010 UK final, singing the 2010 Eurovision entry, That sounds good to me, composed by Pete Waterman.
1. Alexis
Alexis is now performing the 2010 UK Eurovision entry, which is an uptempo, pop tune with some dance elements. The guy, just like in his first performance of the night, looks very confident and he knows that he can make it to Oslo. At least, that is what he has expressed in the introduction video. Regarding his outfit, Alexis looks quite smart wearing a dark suit and black shirt, too. The audience welcomes his performance.
2. Esma
Esma, while performing the British entry, looks as sweet as she did in her previous performance. Her vocals sound a bit weaker this time, maybe she is nervous, which makes her forget part of the song, unfortunately. This could mean the end of her Eurovision hopes. The girl thanks the audience for supporting her despite the accident. Let's see what happens.
3. Josh
Just at the beginning of Josh's performance, we can clearly predict that tonight's battle will be decided between Josh and Alexis. Josh seems to have learned from his first performance, as he looks much more dynamic than before, dancing to the Eurovision tune confidently and flawlessly. The whole number makes an one of the best impressions of the night.
The voting lines will open shortly.
Now you can vote for your favourite act on our poll .
Now it's time for the first interval act of the show: Sugababes are now on stage performing Wear my kiss. Jade Ewen joined the popular British band last year, after her Eurovision participation.
Phone lines are now closed. The results will come out shortly.
The next interval act is on stage: the 2009 Eurovision winner, Alexander Rybak of Norway, performing Fairytale.
The winner of the UK selection and therefore the British representative at Eurovision 2010 is going to be announced.
JOSH WILL REPRESENT THE UNITED KINGDOM IN OSLO.
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The show was rubbish and thrown together. The song itself isn't bad. I don't think we'll win but we'll certainly not come last
@ Laila - your comments are rich, given the appalling standard of the Russian entry this year. When you've competed for more than 50 years, won five times and come second 16 times, then I might listen. One victory with dreadful closet case singer who can't pronounce words properly in English...pathetic,
that sounds very bad to me!
20-25 placing for the UK again.
boring song. UK is a let down. Bottom 5 and don't complain. You can't produce a good song for christ's sake. Even Romania sends better songs!!!
What a terrible show!! The acts were very very poor, the song is useless and even Mr Norton kept fluffing his lines. TERRIBLE!
Tonight was dreadful. Josh was the best of a bad bunch.....
A bad song and not a good performer. UK will be near the bottom again this year. Sad.
I don't know why I ever had faith in tonights show. I suppose I was blinded by my love of Stock Aiken and Waterman songs as I grew up on them.
This sounds like a song they had left over from years ago. The production values are soo 90's (Steps era) which to me isnt a bad thing, it's just the singers they got to sing it! God the poor things looked uncomfortable and would probably have no interest singing that kind of song if it were not for the chance to represent their country in eurovision. The guy chosen was.. alright but the song didnt suit his voice at all. I felt really sorry for Esma, I liked her voice best in the first songs but she sounded horrible on the eurovision song.
A better idea would have been to get back all the old school classic acts such as Sonia, Dead or Alive, Steps and let them have a battle to sing something by Stock Aiken Waterman. Would have been much more believeable.
Having said all that though, the song is still sadly better than most of the other entrys this year. It's gonna do really badly for us though, no doubt somewhere in the bottom 10.
It's a good song but it should have been Alexis. Actually, none of the singers were that good tbh.
Who the hell is this @TOM JONES character on this site???
I think you need to calm down love seriously!!!!
So what if people don't like it, relax
I have seen your comments before, why are you so aggressive towards people??
OMG
This site is becoming more and more bizarre!!!!
Im now seriously angry at the BBC for their poor live sound quality, Pulling poor children out of stage school to fill spaces and basically making the whole show seem very very desbrate.
I think Esma's nerves got the better of her. She was way too stiff on stage
and she slouched alot.
She seemed so confident in her interview I really thought with the confidence, vocals and diaspora she would win.
But I much prefer Josh he is confident, calm, cool, and collective on stage and has very good vocals
Best of Luck UK, I think we will do well
SHUT UP WANKS MOST YOU ARE UK SONG GREAT ALL SONGS I HEAR FULL SHIT UP YOURS
OMG! Didn't I know it! I knew it was unpromising considering those guys' older material.
That Esma even forgot the words to the song she said she would put her "heart and soul" into. Hahahaahaha, OMG!
The gayest and most kitsch/camp song this year. Just tragic.
Soooo terrible. They so deserve to come last again this year. This is Andy Abraham material. It's just not a good song at all and they don't deserve the votes just because they are UK and a big 4. 
Josh is the obvious best singer here. I won't say anything bad about him because he sang fine... I just feel bad for him having to sing that awful song on Eurovision and possibly not even do well. 
This is going straight to my HATE list for 2010.
Awful song again from UK!
Why didn't Miss Fitz get chosen??? they were good
I felt sorry for Esma
she tried her best!
But Josh is a great choice I wanted him to win out of the chosen three
The song is not bad at all I think it will get points on the night
Ah well, Dublin, Madrid or Oslo 2011.
Never mind boys and girls Melodifestivalen final tomorrow.
I think the Swedish Embassy is in Marylebone They'll be closed tomorrow but I'll be there on Monday asking for daul citizenship.
Josh was the best anyway
In terms of vocals and performance
At least I get to hear 9 better songs tomorrow!
The bst thing about the whole show was not playing the winning song and artist till the end.. says it all...
Stockholm 2011 anybody?
No it isn't better then the other 20 songs chosen till now. In fact it is one of the worst. I even prefer the song from my own country.
Okay...okay the song isn't the greatest...but its still better than at least 20 of the songs picked so far by other countries!
lol the intro's sound like kids in america by kim wilde
Esma poor thing looked like a tiny diva but totaly blew it
Josh: can hold a tune but stil 2 bland , no expression on camera what so ever
Alexis: cute but again not impressed
the song its self is kinda cheap even for me ...sorry 
just send the sugababes instead
Maybe in the early 90 but my God it's 2010...... This song is so oldfashioned... I really can not stand it. Sorry UK but no top 10, not even top 20... A crap tacky song and whoever you choose as a singer, 3 kids without any experience and absolutely untrained bad voices.... This is the perfect mix for a total disaster. One of the worse songs this year.
Josh's phone line is permanently engaged. I hope that doesn't mean he's going to lose votes to the other two no-hopers.
Was that the song they just sang? I totally missed that. It really sucks. The beginning sounds just like "Kids in America". Unimaginative.
jesus its a bad song!! enough said!
Please Europe give it the nil points it deserves!
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