SLOVENIA

The Slovenian Final was held on February 24th at Gospodarsko Razstavisce in Ljubljana, hosted by Tina Gorenjak, Maja Martina Merljak, Tanja Kocman & Mario Galunic. Before the final there were 2 semi-finals where the top4 qualified from each. The winner was chosen by televoting (50%) & 6 regional "expert" juries (50%). The winning act was Omar Naber singing his self-penned song “On my way”

Omar is alone on stage with a microphone stand and starts in black and white. Around him are bold spot lights which accentuate the contrast whilst in black and white. At the start of the first chorus the screen turns back to colour which shows the stage a cobalt blue colour. It then reverts back to black at white for the chorus again, returning to colour for the rest of the song. During the end repetition of the chorus, he loses the stand and moves about at the front of the stage before placing his hand in the air during the last line. The camera angles are very clever with mostly close ups apart for the chorus which gives a feeling of movement and ‘going’ somewhere. That said there is very little movement by Omar and this could look might have looked like a very static and boring performance in the hall.

The song starts off gently with a piano intro. The tune of this part of the song is very old fashioned, maybe even a little twee, with some very predictable rhymes andsome very odd phrases. It is then beefed up with a harder drum beat and orchestration in the chorus which mirrors the change of visuals. This pattern is then repeated for the second verse and chorus. After this there is some oooh-oooh-ing before another chorus with added key change. This doesn’t quite follow the tune of the previous ones as there are extra lines at the end. The whole thing finishes off with a repetition of the title. Apart from the last chorus, Omar sings this really well and gives quite a solid, almost musical theatre-esque vocal serenade.

This is a performance of contradictions. Omar is dressed nattily in a jacket, jeans, trainers, one glove and sports his (trademark?) spikey hairdo. His performance style involves a lot of gesticulating, pointing, beckoning, leg shimmying and a rather wide leg stance. But this is a slow song, an anthemic ballad, albeit a dated one. Nothing he does suits the song. He either needs to calm down or speed up the song. The song is really nothing special, in fact I think a lot of the meaning of the song is lost because of the muddled performance. The lyrics, as I stated before, are old hat and explore nothing new. It's so idiosyncratically Eurovision - it's all too much, . One might even expect to see this at Eurobeat Moldova (the spoof Eurovision musical) rather than Eurovision itself.

I cannot see who would vote for this - or why. It might appeal to musical lovers (espeically those on the jury) but it is just too derivative to stand out. I am not even sure what they could do to make it better. Omar Naber is well known in Eurovision circles has he participated in the semi final in 2005 but did not progress – but many see this as an injustice. That said, this qualifying would ALSO be an injustice.

ARTIST - Omar Naber

SONG - On my way

MUSIC - Omar Naber

LYRICS - Omar Naber