Sweden's Benjamin Ingrosso gets his spotlight on stage

02 May 2018 at 16:40 CEST

Sweden rehearsal Andres Putting

Dancing front and centre, Benjamin Ingrosso treats the stage to quite a light show during his first Lisbon rehearsal.

Benjamin Ingrosso is a Swedish singer and songwriter who is turning heads with his contemporary twist of polished pop tones and soulful performance bravado. Born in the outskirts of Stockholm in 1997, Benjamin was raised with strong ties to his Italian heritage. The self-trained pianist and guitarist spent his early childhood crafting his ear for songmanship. It served him well, for by the age of nine he had already penned his first certified gold hit.

The last three years have seen the 20-year-old artist garner national admiration, critical acclaim and millions of streams for many of his self-written tracks. Benjamin is one of Sweden’s most popular male pop-artists with over 25 million streams on Spotify. He has reached Platinum (once) and Gold (three times) with his singles Good Lovin', Do You Think About Me and One More Time.

In mid-March, Benjamin won Melodifestivalen 2018, the Swedish national selection for the Eurovision Song Contest, with the song Dance You Off. He was chosen through a combination of public votes and votes from an international jury.

READ MORE: Benjamin Ingrosso's profile.

In today's rehearsal, Benjamin was dancing alone on stage in front of a backdrop of red, white, and blue LED lights. As they move and change to the beat, it looks like a music video live on stage! He is wearing a black patent leather jacket, black trousers and bright white sneakers, which works to emphasize his leg work even more.

Benjamin was thrilled to have arrived in Lisbon, he told Eurovision.tv: "Even though I was a bit nervous, my first rehearsal went pretty good."

There are not that many changes from his performances of Dance You Off in the Swedish national selection, Melodifestivalen: "I have different clothes this time which are custom made, so they fit very well, but otherwise I think we’re trying to achieve the same kind of number and vibe. I’m just gonna try to be a little bit more comfortable on stage and enjoy it", Benjamin explained.

Dance You Off was written and composed by MAG, Louis Schoorl, K Nita and Benjamin Ingrosso. Benjamin will perform it on behalf of Sweden in the second Semi-Final of the 2018 Eurovision Song Contest on the 10th of May.