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Live: Greece decides
Click HERE to watch the Greek Final
It's time for Greece to select its representative for the 52nd Eurovision Song Contest. Sarbel, Tamta and Christos Dantis will be competing to succeed Anna Vissi. The 28th Greek representative at the Eurovision Song Contest will be chosen tonight at 21:00 CET. The show, called Dynamose to! (Pump it up!), takes place at Athinon Arena, in Athens. Maria Bakodimou and Fotis Sergoulopoulos, a popular TV duo, will host the show and they are promising a spectacular show. TV viewers and a jury panel will vote through tele-vote and SMS messages, on a 50%-50% basis, and decide which song will represent Greece. Among the jury members our very own Managing Director of esctoday.com, Barry Viniker.
LIVE
The show has started. A video presentation of public interviews and what the Greek media report these days. The Athinon Arena packed 2500 people. The motto of tonight's show is Pump it up! The hosts announce breaking news that some people are reacting against the show at the Omonoia square. It's just a video made by them, Host Fotis Sergoulopoulos is performing at this video the song Fame, Irene Cara's hit. The party starts..
Dancers are performing It's raining men on stage. The hosts are thanking the fans of the contest - especially OGAE Greece, followed by the presentation of the jury panel. The jury consists of: composer Mimis Plessas- chairman, General Director of ERA and song writer Antonis Andrikakis, advisor to ERT President Johnny Kalimeris, composer Dimitris Kontopoulos, publisher Petros Kostopoulos, TV presenter Eleonora Meleti, music producer Konstantis Spyropoulos, actress Rea Toutountzi, OGAE Greece Chairman Antonis Karatzikos and last but not least Managing Director of esctoday.com Barry Viniker.
The hosts announce Mihai Traistariu, Romanian representative in the 2006 Eurovision Song Contest. He performs his entry Tornerò which was a big success in Greece. The crowd is dancing in the rhythm of Tornerò, jury members included. Mihai is saying that this is the 32nd time he's visiting Greece after the Eurovision Song Contest. Greece changed his life. Now he is performing a ballad, called Why. Its a powerful ballad which came 2nd in a former Romanian selection for the Eurovision Song Contest. And now Mihai is performing his new hit Dimmi sì o no, which is officially presented in Greece for the first time. The lyrics are half English half Italian... a successful receipe for Mihai.
Currently, there is a video presentation of former Eurovision Song Contest entries. Meanwhile the director of the show is showing us some former Greek participants among the crowd. Natasa Theodoridou, a well known singer in Greece is now performing some Greek songs of her own repertoire.
The stage of the show: more impressive than ever! Last year's host broadcaster did an amazing job. Video walls and a lot of colours are this year's elements.
The host is asking the crowd: "What are the elements of a good ballad?" A video presentation of former ballads that took part in the Eurovision Song Contest follows. Fans must be happy. We can say that the 50 years history of the contest is presented in this one night show.
And now a parody: Host Maria Bakodimou is presenting her own ballad. Wearing a long dress is singing her proposal for the Contest, called This dress makes me look fat! Jury members are giving votes for her performance. A really funny moment.
Now its time to welcome Evridiki, Cyprus' representative. Along with the composer of the song, Dimitris Korgialas, she will be performing Comme çi, comme ça.
The Hosts make public the phone numbers for the televoting:
- Sarbel - Yassou Maria - Tel: 90 11 11 007 01 - SMS 'E 01' to 4536
- Tamta - With love - Tel: 90 11 11 007 02 - SMS 'E 02' to 4536
- Christos Dantis - No Madonna - Tel: 90 11 11 007 03 - SMS 'E 03' to 4536
The hosts are now presenting DJ BoBo. The Swiss representative is now performing his song Vampires are alive, for the first time on stage. Him and his dancers offered an amazing performance, a powerful choreography.
Hosts now will present once again their own proposal for the Eurovision Song Contest. Host, Fotis Sergoulopoulos, wearing a purple shirt full of christmas tree lights performs his pop proposal Hi hi baby! He added a little bit of Riverdance at the end , but the jury panel is cruel again... Low votes again by them.
A video presentation of Greek singers who participated in the past at some national finals is now shown. And now..... the first contestant:
- SARBEL - YASSOU MARIA
- Music: Marcus Englof - Alex Papaconstantinou
- Lyrics: Μack
Sarbel, accompanied by four female dancers, seems to be quite nervous. He's dressed in leather trousers and silver top.
- TAMTA - WITH LOVE
- Music: Nikos Terzis
- Lyrics: Poseidonas Giannopoulos
- CHRISTOS DANTIS - NO MADONNA
- Music: Christos Dantis
- Lyrics: Christos Dantis - Natalia Germanou
He's dressed in black, accompanied by 5 female dancers, which currently took off their skirts! And guess what? A mediocre performance again. It will be interesting to see if there have been some technical problems for all the contestants.
Hosts are presenting Belarus' representative, Dmitry Koldun and his song Work your magic. Bulgarian representatives on stage now.
Another funny performance from the hosts of the show. Parody of a traditional Greek song. A greek artist, Yiorgos Magkas followed them.
Once again we watch a video of the three acts. The lines are open now. TV viewers and a jury panel will vote through tele-vote and SMS messages, on a 50%-50% basis, and decide which song will represent Greece.
Natasa Theodoridou is performing again some of her songs.
Whoever wins the ''golden ticket'' must work a lot on his/her performance. Tonight, none of the three artists convinced us. Of course they were all nervous, it was a hard competition. Maybe there have been some technical problems. Nevertheless, the reactions of our readers show that performances of the artists weren't enough for them to choose their favourite.
Hosts are moving to the jury panel, asking them some questions. The hosts announce Europe's Number one in 2005. Helena Paparizou on stage! They mentioned the OGAE award that Helena Paparizou won this year and the Greek club will have to organise the event. Helena didn't vote tonight. She has a close connection with all the composers as she performed in past some songs composed by them.
Antonis Karatzikos, president of OGAE Greece gives to Helena the award that OGAE Italy had prepared for the winner, an Etruscan statue.
In a while we'll have the results. One of them is the winner. Winner once again was ERT as well. A really good show, just a little bit...long.
And the winner is... Sarbel!
Related polls
- Greece decided: How much do you like Opa?
- esctoday.com National Final Awards 2010: Best SONG not to qualify in GREECE?
- esctoday.com National Final Awards 2010: Best PERFORMANCE not to qualify in GREECE?
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Hi!
Greece, Serbia or Cyprus will win!
Good luck from Romania!
very disappointing .greece send much better songs in esc the previous years.this is very usual and boring.sorry
0 points
I really enjoyed the Greek National Selection show
on February 28th!!!! Well done, ERT!!
FOUR NICE, ORIGINAL --SATIRICAL-- SONGS WERE SUNG
BY THE PRESENTERS, Fotis and Maria (they are not singers)
ON THINGS ESC PERFORMERS SHOULD AVOID AT EUROVISION
AND THEY WERE SIMPLY BRILLIANT, AWESOME!!!!! 
Translation: I think this dress makes me look fat (electro-pop/new age)
http://www.youtube.c(...)/watch?v=JBdHHAKFhtI
Translation: With a name of origin (mixed style)
http://www.youtube.c(...)/watch?v=fb5GDJ1U6Ks
Sexual Harrassment (rock song)
http://www.youtube.c(...)/watch?v=zKVaHtYHB4s
Hi, baby, hi (pop song)
http://www.youtube.c(...)/watch?v=aoHSgnHUe2A
i wanted dantis or tamta but on stage id idnt like any of them
sarbel was better at stage anyway
CYPRUS-evridiki
http://www.evridikis.com
1. Bulgaria
2. Macedonia
3. Switzerland
4. Malta
5. Finland
6. Iceland
7. Ireland
8. Romania
9. Greece
10. Montenegro
----------------------------------
11. Cyprus
12. Slovenia
13. Spain
14. Norway
15. Netherlands
16. Armenia
17. Estonia
18. Latvia
19. Belarus
20. Denmark
21. Israel
22. Belgium
23. Moldova
24. Albania
25. Poland
Greetings from FINLAND
A spanish/swede
Norwegian/swede
Greek/swede! sweden is everywhere.
Tamta was my fav.
top 5
Malta
Belarus
Poland
Estonia
Iceland
I love the song and the show was good but i didn't like the presenteres!Last year's presenters were far faaaaaar much better!!
Well done, Greece!
My top 5:
- Slovenia
- Greece
- Malta
- FYROM
- Denmark
Greetings from Bosnia & Herzegovina
http://www.youtube.c(...)=related&search=
Personally, I hated Tamta's song. I thought it would have been a bad showing for Greece. I thought the song by Sarbel was okay, but they'd be in the semi next year guaranteed. That leaves us with Eurovision song contest winning, Mr Dantis (2005). I thought his song was going to be the winner in GReece and go close to winning in Helsinki.
Now I didn't see the final, and from what I heard about it's length, it's good I didn't. Sarbel will do I suppose. I wish whatever happened with the choreography gets sorted out.
the show was boring
Gia sou Helsinki!! Maria...oops I mean Sarbel is coming!!
Greece chose very well tonight! This is a great song, and it shoudl do well with a great stage presentation :-)
My only suggestions to Sarbel:
1. get new dancers (WHO CAN ACTUALLY DANCE) and change the choreography FAST!!
2. hands gripped together like your praying needs to be dropped!
re: tamta - who dressed this woman??? surely she could have done better than that dress!!! her stage presentation was just plain AWFUL!!!
One of my biggest complaints of the show were the hosts.
Giorgos and Zeta were 100 times better! I hope they commentate ESC this year and NOT Fotis and Maria.
I can imagine it now......them and there dumb remarks. Like when they told Korgialas that he should propose to Evridiki on stage for votes.....
Sarbel was by far the best and as the most warm supporter of him in here, I feel justified.
Nevertheless Tamta could have won but her stage perfomance was bad...sorry
On regard to Dantis he was absolutely terrible...If No Madonna won, we would reach the 25th place for sure...the first time that Greece would be placed last.pity I was expecting something better than him
I am happy that Sarbel convinced even those , who didnt support him initially.
Maria and Fotis wer mediocre...last year I had serious objections about Kapountzides and Zeta but this year we really missed them...the videos with the awards were very annoying.
Also the big shame is that ERT allowed that terrible creature a famous anti-ESC singer to perform on stage! a big shame! she didnt deserve it
Go Sarbel Go Greece!
One thing though is that a couple of jurers said they voted Sarbel because their daughters wanted them to. Although its a good choice, they shouldnt vote for their daughters.
Oh and yes Daniella. Tom. we will have the GREEK SOAP OPERA - PART 2!
All the channels will complain, and have conspiricy theoreos. Most now toward the end were pro-tamta, so that is going to be interesting tom. They either supported Tamta or Dantis. And Sarbel won. (LOL).
Watching his closing performance, I liked it.
What was up with Tamta's hood and gloves? she looked like Michael Jackson (LMAO)
Her stage show RUINED the song.
Good Vibes"""""Seems to me "the 80s is coming back" for Greece! What a terrible Unprofessional show was this one! No sense of timing!
Sarbel needs URGENTLY a new choreography to *highten* the amazing (thank God) instrumental bridges that this song offers -- and who knows? !!"""""
and what is the uk sending this year Mr vibes?
and what posotion did you finish last year?
oh i forgot it dosent matter since the UK is at the final every year no matter how BAD you do!!
It's a pity about Tamta. A nice song totaly destroyed by its presantation on stage. Tamta was not good vocaly either.
Maybe mr. Soulis (the director of the song) needs some lessons from the absolute perfect visual result of "Lane Moja" and "Layla".
i dont like the song
he has more chances for points with his shakin on stage
lots of work
i prefer tamta or dantis
hope they ll work alot until eurovision night
i liked Belarus song on tonight show
http://www.evridikis.com
I am quite tired of all the whining here about the duration of the show ! All these shows here in Greece are long, because they are PRODUCTS and need financing from advertisements ! If you don't like them, don' t watch them ! Since most of you who complain, don't even know our language, how can you know if it is interesting for us or not ? But if you do watch them, show some respect please ! Are you gonna tell us how to do our tv shows now ? Give us a break !
As for the result, Sarbel was by far the best TONIGHT and so he won. Simple as that ! I'm relieved that at least it wasn't the horrible Dantis song !
The result is absolutely fair. "Yasou Maria" was my less favorite song, but tonight was by far the best one.
Tamta made just what i was afraid of...a Circus. A presentation absolutely stranger to the mood of her song.
Dantis was not good either. I din't like at all the idea about his dancers. His voice was too "heavy".
@Daniel
Since until now NO country has "such a good song", he'll have a chance to be best from the bad.
I AM REALLY SATISFIED WITH THE RESULT. SARBEL LOOKS AND MOVES GREAT & THE CHOREOGRAPHY IS QUITE GOOD. ALTHOUGH I WAS IN FAVOUR OF DANTIS WHEN I FIRST HEARD THE SONGS AFTER TODAY'S PERFORMANCES I CHANGED MY MIND AND VOTED FOR SARBEL.
WERE is Daniella now saying that the Jury supported Dantis? They voted Dantis last! Tamta was voted last by the public.
well Sarbel has not such a good song.Good luck with that Greece 
Seems to me "the 80s is coming back" for Greece! What a terrible Unprofessional show was this one! No sense of timing!
Sarbel needs URGENTLY a new choreography to *highten* the amazing (thank God) instrumental bridges that this song offers -- and who knows? !!
Good Luck Greece.
PS: ERT, PLEASE, is Mr. Evangelinos around?
Finally!
Maria to Helsinki!
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