Earlier tonight, the team from wiwibloggs were glued to our computers watching Malta’s most popular current affairs show Xarabank. And no, we hadn’t developed a sudden interest in the ins and outs of the island’s political scene. We were tuned in to watch as the 20 semi-finalists for Malta Eurovision Song Contest 2016 were announced.
Last week, TVM revealed the 49-song shortlist for this year’s contest. It featured several past finalists, including Christabelle, Jessika and Daniel Testa. Perhaps the biggest name was Ira Losco, the Eurovision 2002 runner-up. Did any of them make it through? The full list is below.
Malta Eurovision Song Contest 2016 semi-finalists
Maxine Pace – “Young Love”
Deborah C – “All Around the World”
Laurence Gray – “You’re Beautiful”
Brooke – “Golden”
Raquel Galdes – “Flashing Lights”
Corazon (Mizzi) – “Falling Glass”
Kimberley Cortis – “Lighthouse”
Jasmine Abela – “Alive”
Domenique Azzopardi – “Empty Hearted”
Jessika – “The Flame”
Daniel Testa – “Under the Sun”
Ira Losco – “That’s Why I Love You”
Franklin Calleja – “Little Love”
Dario Mifsud Bonnici – “I Love You”
Dominic – “Fire Burn”
Danica Muscat – “Frontline”
Ira Losco – “Chameleon (Invincible)”
Christabelle Borg – “Kingdom”
Sarah Crytsal – “Right Here With You”
Stefan Galea – “Light Up My Life”
MALTA EUROVISION SONG CONTEST 2016 SHORTLISTED ENTRIES
The following 29 songs did not advance to the semi-final.
- Francesca Bonanno – “96”
- Chaya Fenech – “Bare Your Soul”
- Kurt Cassar – “Battle Zone”
- Lyndsay Pace – “Beautiful”
- Andre Curmi (Dre) – “Brave”
- Cherylis & Mikhail – “Breaking Point”
- Cherylis – “Breathe”
- Jessika – “Can’t Let Go”
- Danica Musvat – “Castle”
- Francesca Borg – “Dancing in the Rain”
- Jean Claude Azzopardi – “Expectional”
- Kelly Ann Mintoff – “Feeling Alive”
- Iona – “Fireworks”
- Franklin Calleja – “Flawless”
- Paul Cuschieri – “Go Beyond The Shore”
- Nazjo Rotin – “Gone”
- Q – “Higher”
- Jessika – “Hush Hush”
- Franklin Calleja – “I Won’t Surrender”
- Neville Refalo – “MI-MI-MIND”
- Joseph Portelli – “Paper Boats”
- Panama Band – Simaria – “Reaching”
- Aidan Cassar – “Rule The World”
- Klinsmann Cloeiro – “Someday”
- Julienne Liberto – “Tell Me What You Wanna Do”
- Kyle Mangani & Maxine Pace – “Tonight”
- Amy Agius – “Victory”
- Kaya – “Without You”
- Malcom – “Your Kiss”
We’ll return to the sunny Mediterranean island on Friday 22 January for the semi-final. Of the 20, only 14 will progress to the Saturday 23 January final. See you then!
Chameleon is very modern.
Ira for ESC 😉
Mmmmm… I Heard all songs… Not Ira’s of course. Diva….
These are my top 3
Golden
Alive
Light up my life.
Most of the entries are copied from songs like
All abt the bass, one last ride, etc etc
Not bad selection this year,even those they are only first clips, but I really think that Malta have their first really good chance of going close to win ESC if they send MAXINE PACE young love, I know we haven’t heard all entries of other countries yet, But this song is a happy go luck beat to it , Go MAXINE PACE YOUNG LOVE
When do they present their songs (the full 3 minutes of each) on that little stage, like they always do? I assume they will post every performance at YouTube when the show’s over, yes?
Chameleon seems very interesting entry 🙂
Go Ira 🙂
Chameleon sounds very promising! If the rest of this song turns out to be great, we could have a real potential winner for the contest let alone the national selection! Golden and Right Here with You are good too. Light Up My Life reminds me of Closer to My Heart by Ylva & Linda.
“Young love” is an exact rip off of “All about that bass”
Lighthouse, Alive and Chameleon are probably the strongest from these snippets.
Don’t know about you guys
But I really really really like quite a lot of these songs!!!!!
It’s going to be a hard NF that’s for sure!
Love the Japanese/Ethnic start to christabelles song!!!!!
Christabelles song has stood out to me the most but I like the sound of most of these songs!
I’m excited!!!
Just by listening to these clips.. I say Ira Loscos Chameleont song seems like the likely winner!
i’m not that impressed tbh, a lot of slow songs but there are a few good songs. my ranking: 1. Ira Losco – Chameleon (Invincible) 2. Sarah Crystal – Right Here with You 3. Maxine Pace – Young Love 4. Christabelle – Kingdom 5. Brooke – Golden 6. Danica Muscat – Frontline 7. Ira Losco – That’s Why I Love 8. Jessika – The Flame 9. Stefan Galea – Light Up My Life 10. Jasmine Abela – Alive 11. Deborah C – All Around The World 12. Daniel Testa – Under The Sun 13. Corazon – Falling Glass 14. Dominic… Read more »
I’m really impressed with some of the songs that made through, choose wisely Malta!
@EugeneescUK : which one of these do you consider a Euphoria rip off?
Christabelle’s song is the best by far.
I hope she will make a good show!
Franklin back with usual sleep inducing rubbish. Raquel needs singing lessons – still!!!
I hope for Maxine or Brooke 🙂
I love Maxine’s song the best ‘Young Love’ seems modern and catchy – can’t wait to hear the full song 🙂
Maxine Pace with Young Love is the only one that sounds different from what we’re used to hear from Malta, the other songs sound just as MESC 2015… Anyway I don’t see anything interesting. Perhaps Jessika.
Yep CookyMonzta, there was a marriage proposal. Dominic proposed to his girlfriend live on Xarabank shortly after the confirmation as a MESC semi-finalist.
Several songs with Swedes involved – Ylva & Linda got in two entries! I’m very surprised to see the winner of Swedish “Idol 2007” Marie Picasso here, as one of the songwriters to “Alive”! There’s been rumours flying around the past years about her entering Melfest, and suddenly she shows up in Malta!
Looking forward to hear the full songs, Jessika’s entry sounds very promising. 🙂
Wow! There are a lot of amazing songs!!!! ?
There are some really great songs and almost all of them sound modern, very now and radio friendly. My favorites thus far are Alive – Jasmine and Golden – Brooke.
A lot of yawn in these previews. Here are my top 5, although I’m not really enthusiastic about any of them yet.
Maxine Pace, Young Love
Franklin Calleja, Little Love
Christabelle Borg, Kingdom
Danica Muscat, Frontline
Daniel Testa, Under the Sun
I’m looking forward to hearing more of the Ira Losco songs, and all, well most, of the rest, but pretty sure there’s no winner in this bunch.
Hope Older Gaia Cauchi does well! (referring to Christabelle)
And Lawrence won’t win. Sorry but his songs sound the same.
This kinda seems like Ira is favorite to win…but it’s gonna look bad on her if BOTH songs fail to win.
@PP: I think the show presented videoclips of Ira performing her songs (one of which looked like a music video). They sent Destiny Chukunyere to her place to interview her after the selections.
@Anthony Ko: I didn’t have to wonder why Dario was emotional. It was obvious. I was at work at the time, and couldn’t turn up the volume. I turned away from the Web page for a moment, then came back, and his name was on the screen and he was emotional. That told me that he also qualified.
Clue me in on something else: I THOUGHT I saw a marriage proposal take place on the show, yes?
After this short clips, for me best song are Young love You re beautiful Golden (when song start in clips, it reminds me on music from Chariots of Fire) The Flame Chameleon ( I think this song is Warrior part 2 ) Right here with you Another 2 songs have potential Alive, Fire burn Daniel Testa and Franklin had better song in past then , Daniel every year weaker song best is from 2014 than from 2015 then 2016 , Franklin had better song last year. My TOP 3 after this clips 1. Golden 2. Chameleon 3. The Flame 4.… Read more »
Where is Ira Losco , we only don t see her and Raquel in studio with other singers. Raquel we saw live but not from studio.
Malta once again has a choice of some good-quality songs (judging from the short clips). In terms of who could do well in Eurovision, I’d say – Jessika, Brooke, Maxine and Ira. I really want to hear more of Ira’s song – Chameleon. It sounds like it will be quite a dark, edgy song that builds, and if it’s as good as the clip indicates to me, it could be a big threat in Stockholm if sent. Although, it’s only a few seconds long.
Ira Losco, Greta Salome, Kaliopi, Deen – it’s becoming a pattern this year.
CookyMonzta: If you were wondering why Dario Mifsud Bonnici got all emotional during the show, it’s because his grandparents congratulated him on becoming a MESC semi-finalist in the VT you might have saw earlier.
Ira losco was robbed in 2002. would love to see her back!
@Paul D: I assume by this time next week they will present their songs in full for the first time, and post to YouTube. If Ira is going to make a decision, on whether to go with both of them, or drop one, she’ll have a month to decide.
Well good luck with that Ira lol
It looks like they’re done.
Brooke: “Golden”
Christabelle Borg: “Kingdom”
Corazon: “Falling Glass”
Danica Muscat : “Frontline”
Daniel Testa: “Under The Sun”
Dario Mifsud Bonnici: “I Love You”
Deborah C: “All Around The World”
Domenic: “Fire Burn”
Domenique Azzopardi: “Empty Hearted”
Franklin Calleja: “Little Love”
Ira Losco: “Chameleon (Invincible)”
Ira Losco: “That’s Why I Love You”
Jasmine Abela: “Alive”
Jessika: “The Flame”
Kimberly Cortis: “Lighthouse”
Lawrence Gray: “You’re Beautiful”
Maxine Pace: “Young Love”
Raquel Galdes: “Flashing Lights”
Sarah Crystal: “Right Here With You”
Stefan Galea: “Light Up My Life”
20 songs from 19 contenders. Ira Losco has 2 of them.
Stefan Galea with the 20th song. But they have 19 contenders. Will they select another song from someone else, to fill their roster with 20 contenders.
That makes 19. One more song to go, unless they select a 21st song, to make it 20 CONTENDERS.
Add Christabelle and Sarah Crystal to the roster.
Christabelle has a really nice song, just like last year!
@PP: And for that, I think she’s going to have a survey on which song the people there like the most. It would be wise for Xarabank to select 21, in the event she decides to go with one or the other, lest she risk losing to someone else because the votes are split between her two songs.
Btw I said it was unfair to the other contestants but I actually think she has the best songs, judging by the snippets lol
Paul D: Again, small world Malta is. t remains to be seen whether she picks one or the other and makes room for another contender, or they send 21 contenders to the show.
Paul D
That can be disadvantage to get 2 song and if both song go to final, she wili get split vote from televote and juries wili be harder to decide to with of her song to give vote.
Did Ira Losco qualify TWICE?! She’s already in, with That’s Why I Love You”. It looks like her OTHER song, “Chameleon (Invincible)” is in as well!
Ira is going to compete with two songs?! that’s unfair to the others
@lol: Small world over there. I was hoping that maybe Red Electrick would take a shot. Too bad Chris Grech is sitting this one out.
Who is Dario Mifsud Bonnici? My sound is off because I’m at work, but if he’s in tears, I think he also made the final 20.
Franklin Calleja is in, with “Little Love”. Did Alex Rybak write this one?
@moco: Raquel’s voice is almost a cross between Dido and Dolores O’Riordan. She and that accent of hers really made “Stop Haunting Me”, more unique than it already was. I was so sure she would qualify for the MESC final and finish no worse than top 5. I hope this new song, “Flashing Lights” is just as good.
Somebody is updating the roster at Wikipedia. Raquel is in, Ira is in, Jessika, Lawrence Gray, Daniel Testa, Corazon, Deborah C. and a few others are in. As of 16:42 E.S.T. (c22:42 C.E.T.), they’ve posted 12.
I think Ira Losco just made it.
raquel yesssssssssss <33333333333333333333333333333333333333333