He came to play and now he’s here to slay. Jüri Pootsmann from Estonia has just completed his first rehearsal at the Globen Arena in Stockholm, and needless to say we were quite impressed!
Jüri donned a double-breasted navy suit and a pair of glasses and wore his blonde hair slicked back, giving him a whole new level of class. Playing on the James Bond Casino Royale theme, he filled the stage with LED playing cards, including expensive clubs and spades. The back wall of LED’s feature vintage baroque style images. And a colour palette of red, gold and white give us money, honey!
Despite all the fabulous, there is one small caveat. At one point Jüri performs a magic trick in which he pulls out a playing card from his pocket and throws it away, only to see it return magically to his hand a few moments later. The cheap gimmick really takes away from what is an otherwise sophisticated performance.
This is, of course, the first rehearsal and everything is subject to change, so we’re hoping they’ll delete said magic trick. Regardless Estonia’s performance remains one of the most memorable of the semi final and that should help Estonia breeze into the grand final.
Estonia: First rehearsal at Eurovision 2016
Estonia: First press conference 2016
Estonia: Interview with Jüri after his first rehearsal
Jüri Pootsmann’s “Play”: Reviews and Reactions
Read all of our Eurovision rehearsal reviews
Photo: Eurovision.tv (EBU)
come on estonia , you should of won eurovision 2015, please please vote ESTONIA 2016
Grete Paia would have won this
Good luck, Jüri! Go nab a contract for the next Bond Theme song and get some gig invitations, that would be cool!
P.S. Wiwibloggs, you need to invite him to your jam as well
From James Bond to Joker?…
From this first preview, the James Bond image fits the song better than this nerdy one.
Not qualifying. And Andy Abraham wants his suit back
This is one of my favorites in this semi and tbh I’m rather disappointed. I also think they should’ve sticked to the Eesti Laul staging, which was amazing enough. Still, I quite enjoy the background, BUT not the card trick and not his suit.
I’m not sure if this will qualify unfortunately.
I am more than sure that SVT will stage this uniquely. Just remember how last year Estonia had “troubles” with its staging in their first rehearsal and you all saw what that became once on TV. Nice. 🙂 So, Estonia, keep up the good spirit.
And his glasses will go, that’s for sure. It’s just a rehearsal folks, for God’s sake!
He should keep the glasses. We need more hipster nerds in the contest!
Wow, Jüri proved again he has the best vocals (male or female) this year, no doubt. It just seems studio version, so impressed, and unlike others singers he doesn’t need to scream or oversing, his voice is powerful by itself. I really like the song as well and the performance will be good.
@Vladimir
I agree with you. As you can see, I am not offending anyone, still though this Kane or whatever their name is, gets annoyed. Some people are so pathetic!
I think everyone has a right to make comments here as much as they please – as long as they’re not offending anyone. If one doesn’t to read someone else’s comments, they have an amazing choice: don’t read them! Btw, Juri’s cool – except the card trick.
Lots of “entitled” people here.
Wear contact lenses, Jüri.
God.
Juri with glasses.
My life is complete.
@Kane
I don’t care if I annoy you, I have the right to post comments and if you don’t want to read them, then get out of this website!
I like it very much!!
It was perfect…Juri will be deinently a qualifier
It’s time for wiwi to get a threaded comment section.
After Zoë he looks like a singing a??hole. Maybe that’s a good thing.
@georgekirkas
let’s have our conversation on the forum, and we don’t annoy other people on here
@Kane
i’m really sorry having annoyed you 🙂
Nicky and georgekirkas, could you get a room? It’s incredibly boring reading through every single comment section and seeing extended conversations between you two. Become friends on social media and keep your private conversations somewhere else.
Well, I think the song got the better of him. He looks too excited on stage and as a result, the song that is supposed to be seductive becomes too much intimidating. I think his inexperience as performer shows here if we look at the other artists. So, no netflix and chill for Juri because the person he’s going after storms out the room before he even finishes.
Interesting performance defends boring song. Maybe Juri would be a Grand Final:)
@Nicky91
I saw it, but I don’t know what it is about. If it’s not about Eurovision, sorry but I’m not interested.
It looks like he’s wearing his dad’s suit. Couldn’t they find a tailor for him?
This should be all about him, less gimmicks and tricks. Just him and his expressions, that’s how good he is interpreting this song.
@georgekirkas
yeah, it’s now more of a comedy act, and i think this is the staging
well the comparison will be made between him and Douwe Bob, both wearing a suit, and both are good looking, so the better one will receive the votes i think
and btw, your comments on the forum are approved, i asked a moderator to approve the comments, because you are my friend and have you seen my x factor game 🙂
I really liked the staging of the preselection. They should bring this to the big stage. That is enough.
I like this, but I wish Mick Pedaja’s “Seis” qualified. The staging for that would have been utterly phenomenal.
The staging and the magic trick need to go! As said below, they transform a good sophisticated song into a gimmick.
no glass, really