Contestants sang their hearts out on Thursday within the Eurovision Song Contest’s second semifinal, with touching ballads and heavy steel in rivalry for the final 10 locations within the grand closing.
Fifteen nations battled it out on the Wiener Stadthalle for the remaining spots in Saturday’s showpiece, with Denmark, Australia, Romania and Ukraine hotly-tipped to make it by means of.
Eurovision is the world’s greatest dwell televised music occasion, usually reaching greater than 150 million viewers, and Vienna 2026 is the seventieth version of the glitzy present the place spectacle and drama go hand in hand.
Bulgarian pop singer Dara received Thursday’s live performance beneath approach with some high-energy and highly-choreographed dancing on “Bangaranga”, opening with the strains: “Come alive / Surrender to the blinding lights / No one’s gonna sleep tonight / Welcome to the riot.”
Azerbaijan’s Jiva got here subsequent with a solo efficiency earlier than billowing white screens.
Romania then swung the present into heavy rock on “Choke Me”, which prompted a minor furore within the Eurovision build-up over the lyrics.
However, singer Alexandra Capitanescu, a grasp’s pupil on the Faculty of Physics in Bucharest, defended the tune, insisting: “Unlike the classic heart, which represents romance or cute love, the anatomical heart suggests vulnerability… and emotions that feel intense, physical and almost painful.”
Denmark and Australia are prone to progress to the seventieth Eurovision Song Contest grand closing, with Bulgaria, Albania and the Czech Republic additionally in rivalry, say bookmakers.
But it might be Goodnight Vienna for Azerbaijan, Luxembourg, Armenia and Switzerland, in keeping with the chances.
Denmark’s Soren Torpegaard Lund, whose background is in musical theater, is gaining traction with “For Vi Gar Hjem” (“Before We Go Home”), an ode to the world of nightclubs.
Australia has appeared at Eurovision by invitation since 2015, ending runner-up in 2016.
But the nation might go one higher this time round because of established star Delta Goodrem.
The 41-year-old had a string of worldwide hits within the early 2000s and is singing “Eclipse”, evoking a romantic alignment of the planets.
Austria gained the fitting to host this 12 months’s Eurovision because of operatic singer JJ’s victory in Basel 2025 with “Wasted Love”.
The Austrian sopranist urged Thursday’s performers to get pleasure from their transient spell within the highlight.
“They should enjoy those three minutes. It’s a very stressful time but they’ve rehearsed so much, they can do it in their sleep,” the 25-year-old informed reporters. “This can be a studying. You develop as an artist being part of such an enormous competitors. And it is also one thing that may jump-start an enormous, profitable and long-lasting profession.
“It just prepares you for the final performance in the grand final. There are always great acts at Eurovision, and this semi-final too is a really, really strong semi-final.”
The 11,200 tickets for every live performance at Austria’s greatest indoor enviornment had been snapped up by followers from greater than 75 nations.
Ten nations made it by means of from Tuesday’s first semifinal.
They included general favorites Finland, plus Greece, Israel, Sweden and Moldova.
Five nations pulled out of this 12 months’s Eurovision over Israel’s participation — the most important political boycott within the present’s historical past relationship again to 1956.
A couple of dozen individuals attended a rally in central Vienna referred to as in help of Israel’s inclusion.
“I organized a little flashmob here to send a message of inclusion, which has always been the spirit of Eurovision, because the spirit of exclusion is starting to ruin all the liberal spirit,” 39-year-old recreation designer Ivo Herzl informed AFP.
This 12 months, the semifinals are being determined by public vote and in addition by skilled juries.
Eurovision main monetary backers Britain, France, Germany and Italy have assured spots in Saturday’s 25-country closing, alongside hosts Austria.
© 2026 AFP