Daniel Kajmakoski — Macedonia’s Eurovision 2015 singer — has today revealed that Grammy-award winning artists MERJ (formerly known as BLACKSTREET) will perform with him on stage in Vienna.
MERJ — Mark Middleton, Eric Williams and Jeremy Hanna — are perhaps best known for their song “No diggity”. They’ve also written and produced songs for Whitney Houston, Bobby Brown, Blackstreet, Usher, Mary J. Blige, and others. Their R&B realness will fit really well with Daniel’s soulful number “Autumn Leaves”.
For Daniel it’s a dream come true. “I still can’t believe that my biggest wish will soon become reality,” he said in a statement sent to wiwibloggs. “These incredibly talented musicians have always been my idols, I grew up with their music and now I am performing with them on Eurovision stage! Performing with idols is a dream come true for every artist!”
It won’t be the first time Daniel has worked with them though. Along with Bulgarian singer Bobo, MERJ and Daniel previoisly performed the charity single “Carry the Flame” for Bulgaria’s Holiday Heroes Foundation, which aids socially disadavantaged families.
A voice and a heart? We swoon…
Daniel will also work with renowned choreographer Mojca Horvat. She’s worked on Broadway and on the opening of Winter Olympic Games, among other things, so we have high hopes.
“The stage performance will follow the emotion of the song, because it’s a ballad we will try to create a bit of mystery and playing with lights on stage,” she says.
For styling Daniel has called on Ivana Rabrenovik, who he met on X Factor Adria. She previously worked with Tijana Dapcevic and Marija Serifovic at Eurovision.
“We will generally use three colors for Daniel and his backing vocals, that is: black, grey and white and some small details. I believe that these three colors look best on the camera. My goal is that they are looking classy and feeling good during the whole performance.
What?!?!
Blackstreet’s “No Diggity” was a huge hit here in the US. I still hear it here on the radio all the time on the old-school hip hop station (and even sometimes on other stations).
@esc1234 – please stop with the Greece vs. Macedonia case, we are over it. Nowadays, political things come from the Caucasus countries. 😉 There is so much love on either videos (Greece & Macedonia) from both countries, so lets not start that flame. 😉
This is gonna be the best scoring Macedonian entry ever, I can feel it….. Cannot wait for their first rehearsal and the Wiwi review which I hope it is coming soon.
Well 1) the only Macedonia i know is a region in Greece and 2) i dont get the point of why they have to perform together but we ll see and then we judge