ITALY 2025

The Italian act and song was confirmed on February 22nd. The annual Sanremo Festival (75º Festival della canzone Italiana) was held from February 11th to 15th. Twenty-nine singers performed 4 times over the 5 nights - 3 times with their official song and once as part of covers night. During each evening they sang their original song, there was be a vote. On the final evening the rankings of the radio jury, press jury and televote created a top 5. All the vote segments were then re-opened to find an overall winner. A few days later the festival winner, Olly, declined the invitation and the runner up then accepted the chance to represent Italy at Eurovision. Going to Basel is Lucio Corsi with the song "Volevo essere un duro" (I wanted to be a tough guy)

Lucio Corsi grew up in Tuscany and became inspired as a young boy to pursue music after watching The Blues Brothers on television. After graduating school he performed in local venues before moving to Milan in 2012. Over the years he has been a support act for Stadio, Brunori Sas, Baustelle and The Who, and has walked the runway as part of a Gucci campaign. He has also participated in the Musicultura, Musica da Bere and Premio Tenco song festivals. Hs early style was influenced by prog and glam rock, gaining critical acclaim for his surrealist & fairy tale lyrical imagery, but has since progressed to a more singer-songwriter style. He has 10 singles and EPs to his name as well as 4 albums, with a 5th being released at the end of March.

Taking my cues from the live Sanremo performances, it needs to be reminded that the musicians on stage are playing live and are backed by a live orchestra and backing singers (much of which will not be the case in Basel!) In all the performances, Lucio has his customary white make up, black eyeliner and wears his hair down, creating a striking look. The backdrop is rather plain but the yellowy-orange lighting creates an positive and optimistic glow that is hinted at in the song. Lucio starts alone just him and his piano we then also see and hear his artistic partner Tommaso doing harmonies and on guitar. Halfway through this long verse the rest of the instrumentation starts up but it still very gentle and goes straight into the chorus and verse two. This is quite a bit shorter than the first but the next chorus is a little longer. By this point Lucio has moved from the piano and is now playing guitar. During the second chorus many of the lines are spaced out with a line sung, then a line played on guitar. Now into the final minute, there is a short bridge before a very short chorus before short, almost spoken word, outro.

This song is very gentle and, although the song has a familiar tone and lilt, it does not sound or look like many of the bombastic or balladeering Italian entries we've had of late. The lyrics (dotted with names, places and recognisable Italian words) are delivered with a subtle quality, almost spoken, and the harmonies are very well done. During Sanremo he wore a number of outfits including a yellow shoulder padded number, a similar but red top and during his Topo Gigio duet  he wore a white tailored suit, accentuating his make up and dark hair. I am not quite sure any of these would translate to the Eurovision stage but with some signposting to the lyrics on the back screen it could come together. The song needs very little work - it is literally seconds off the 3 minute mark - but the presentation - without Lucio changing his own style - needs some thinking through. What was presented on the Sanremo stage was primarily for the Italian public, not the rest of Europe. Unfortunately, I feel this song is not in contention for the win but does hold a place for another different song style in the show. This is a shame as it is a technically good song sung by an intriguing singer. This will get some love from the jury and televote but for many this will be memory holed by the busyness around it.

ARTIST - Lucio Corte

SONG -Volevo essere un duro

WRITING/PRODUCTION CREDITS - Lucio Corsi, Antonio Cupertino, Tommaso Ottomano

ITALY 2024

The Italian act and song was confirmed during a press conference on February 11th. During the previous 5 nights the yearly  "Festival della Canzone Italiana di Sanremo" was held. Over the different nights, a number of  votes were held including a press vote, a demoscopic jury vote and public televoting. On the final night, votes were combined and the top 5 songs then participated in a superfinal. The morning after the festival the winner announced they would be participating in Eurovision with their winning song. Going to Malmö is Angelina Mango performing the song "La Noia" (Boredom)

Angelina Mango was born into a very musical family; her mother being Laura Valente, former singer of Matia Bazar, and her father, Giuseppe Mango, whose recording name was Mango. She grew up with her older brother Filippo in Lagonegro, where their love for music was fostered. In September 2014, Mango enrolled at a Liceo Scientifico but stopped her studies following the sudden death of her father. Later she moved to Milan where she continued her studies and playing with her band with her brother as a drummer.  In 2021, she participated in the selections of Sanremo Giovani, but was not selected as a finalist. In 2022 she became a competitor on the long running talent show "Amici di Maria De Filippi", finishing in second place overall and winning the singing category. Last year, her song "Ci pensiamo domani" reached the top ten of the singles chart and was certified triple platinum, while the accompanying EP was certified gold. 

This composition is wholly in Italian, as is customary for songs in Sanremo, and each act had added live accompaniment from the orchestra and extra vocal support from the bank of off stage backing singers. The Sanremo stage, although impressive, had limited scope and size compared to a Eurovision stage. However Angelina's yellow and black strobing background went well with the song and helped emphasise when the beat kicked in. Angelina is alone on stage but fills the stage with her personality - she is good mover but it all feels natural and not overly choreographed. The song has a Mediterranean feel as well as relying a lot on the music and lyrics of the rhythms and carnival atmosphere of South America. The song flip-flops between the rhythmic polysyllabic verses and the repetitive but sparse chorus.

Angelina performed three times during the festival -  once during covers night when she performed a song from her father's repertoire and three times with this song. Her staging was very similar each time doing similar moves around the stage and as well as up and down the stairs (although on the final night she slipped up the stairs!) Angelina does a great job of balancing the performance to the crowd, the performance down the camera and her own vocal capacity. It will be very interesting to see how the team decides to enlarge this setup for Eurovision. I am not saying that having Angelina on her own would be a bad thing but they absolutely need to ensure she does not look alone or adrift. I can imagine her reproducing her Sanremo appearance on the in-the-round-stage and making it look carnival-like with all the waving flags and swaying hands of the fans around her. I feel like some extra musicians, especially percussionists, might give the setting a bit more focus but also give Angelina a reason to move around the stage AND give her people to interact with. Nobody should be bored when this comes on !

ARTIST - Angelina Mango 

SONG - La Noia

WRITING/PRODUCTION CREDITS -  Francesca Calearo, Dario Faini, Angelina Mango

ITALY 2023

The Italian final "73º Festival della Canzone Italiana di Sanremo" was held over 5 nights with the final on February 11th. The main hosts of the event were Amadeus, who also served as the artistic director for the competition, multiple Sanremo participant Gianni Morandi as well as multiple special guests hosts over the festival. Over the 5 nights different votes were held including a press vote, a demoscopic jury vote and public televoting. When all the votes had been combined, the top 5 songs then participated in a superfinal where just the televote would decide the winner. The morning after the festival the winner announced they would be participating in Eurovision. However  the song he would sing was not confirmed as the entry until 13th March. Going to Liverpool is Italy's 2013 participant Marco Mengoni with his Sanremo song "Due Vite" (Two lives).

Marco Mengoni started taking singing lessons at 14 and sang in a five-piece vocal group. He enrolled in a degree in Languages in Rome but also performed in piano bars and weddings whilst also gaining experience as a sound mixer and as a music programmer. in 2009, Marco won Italian X Factor receiving a recording contract and a place in the Sanremo Music Festival 2010 where he eventually came 3rd. He returned to Sanremo in 2013 winning the festival with "L'essenziale" then coming a credible 7th at  Eurovision in Malmö. Over the past 13 years he has released 7 studio albums and won multiple MTV music awards.

On stage at Sanremo, Marco is alone although the orchestra is on either side. The staging is very still and the prominent colours are blue and white. The song starts with piano backing and Marco's vocals are staccato, almost spoken. In the pre chorus his vocal becomes stronger and as each line raises up a tone it creates some anticipation for the chorus. Here, the chorus returns to being more ethereal and strings based and is extremely complex in structure but ends noticeably with the title of the song. On the start of verse two there is a audible beat which runs into the pre chorus. The chorus once again loses the beat and returns to its string filled backing. This chorus runs a little short and runs into an oddly phrased bridge before returning one last time to a shortened chorus then title of the song is repeated at the very end.

As with many Italian language ballads the song is dynamic and dramatic. The music ebbs and flows and the lyrics can be drawn out or packed in quickly. This makes for an interesting sound journey. Marco's voice really shines with this style of song although he will need to think about playing not just to the audience in front of him but down the camera as well - unless they have some other visual technique for the audience to focus on. They may need something to hang the narrative on such as a dancer or dancers portraying the story or some kind of video loop playing it out.

The main thing the Italian delegation have to struggle with is that this song is almost a minute too long. The introduction isn't even that long, nor the outro, so finding cuts to this song may well be monumental. Unfortunately we have experienced so many songs from Sanremo, and its Albanian counterpart, that have been been cut so badly that the heart of the song has been ripped out. resulting in some acts' hopes of qualifying/winning going down the drain. I honestly do not know which parts of this song they can take away or shorten without harming its chances. I am guessing that as the Italian delegation did not replace the song - which they did say was a possibility -that some way of concentrating the song, rather than diluting it, has been found. I don't think this will be a winner but will be an all round class act on stage.

ARTIST - Marco Mengoni

SONG - Due Vite

WRITING/PRODUCTION CREDITS -  Edd, Marco Mengoni, Davide Petrella,  Davide Simonetta

ITALY 2021

The Italian final (Festival della canzone Italiana di Sanremo) concluded on March 6th at the Teatro Ariston of Sanremo, hosted by Amadeus & Fiorello. The festival lasts 5 evenings with different rounds and demographics of voting happening each night. On the Saturday evening, the public was able to vote for their favourites and after the the different voting results had been put together, the top 3 songs were placed in a 'superfinal'. Here, the overall winner would be decided from a combination of demoscopic jury (33%) press jury (33%) and televoting (34%). The winning act had first refusal to go to Eurovision, and during the winners' press-conference they confirmed they would be accepting the invitation. The winning act was Måneskin with the song "Zitti e buoni" (Shut up and behave)

During the four nights that they performed this song they wore a number of different outfits in a range of different colours, usually with all members of the band in the same outfit. The set up of the stage was generally the same with the lead singer front and centre, a guitarists on each side and the drummer at the back. The guitarists and singer move about quite a bit and interact with each other around the stage. The lighting and backdrop of Sanremo is rather basic and for the most part the stage was dark with plenty of red flashes against a dark background.

The song starts with one of the signature guitar riffs and and a pretty beefy drum beat then lead singer Damiano comes in with his monotonous verse. Not sure if this could be classed as rap, especially with such a raspy tone to his voice. The verse part is rather prolonged, almost like 2 verse in one and the backing track builds throughout the song. The chorus runs straight in from the verse and here the note are held for a tad longer making the rhythm stand out from what has gone on before. Then there is a instrumental break before the next verse which is pretty non-stop - the tempo and cadence of the  Italian language really lends itself  to this part. After another chorus there is another different instrumental where the strings of the orchestra really stands out. Then there is a extended bridge which mirrors this backing track and slows the pace down before a final chorus.

All the members of the band went to the same high school in Rome when they decided to set up a band. One of the founding members, guitarist Victoria, is half Danish hence the Nordic-inspired band name (forever pronounced wrongly throughout!)  which means Moonshine. Their big breakthrough came in 2017 when they participated in the 11 series of X Factor eventually coming second. Their chart record is rather impressive with five top 10 singles and their debut album going 3x Platinum. Their second album will be released in the coming days.

The song has some great earworms. The guitar riffs are really infectious and work well on their own and with singing on top of it. They must be given some credit for a half decent stage show under rather restrictive circumstances and staging but also that the live result is actually not that dissimilar to that of the the studio version. I can imagine given a bit more scope in the staging this could be visually stunning The whole thing is really catchy and if proably the best rock song out of the songs we already have on the setlist and i can imagine this doing really well. Obviously the Sanremo songs have additional live orchestral backing and the studio version is obviously more guitar based. It will be interesting to see in the reworking of the song (which will have to happen as it is just a few seconds too long) if they add some strings to give the song more ooomph. This did well in the Italian televote as their fans we well versed on voting for them during their stint on X Factor. Europe-wide, however, I don't see this as a winning song but could potentially cipher votes from acts that might purely on its originality

ARTIST - Måneskin
SONG - Zitti e buoni (Shut up and behave)
WRITING CREDITS - Damiano David, Victoria De Angelis, Thomas Raggi, Ethan Torchi

13/03/ ITALY – UPDATE

After announcing that Nina Zilli would sing her San Remo song it was the announced that her song had been changed to “L'amore è femmina” (Love is female)

The song is in Italian but it though that the lyrics balance between English and Italian may change before May. The song is an up-tempo jazzy number, something skin to what Amy Winehouse or Paloma Faith could come out with. It definitely has a bit more swagger and attitude to her previous song. It’s not exactly singalong-able but had a definite rhythm and oomph about it which will stick in people’s minds.

The only down side to this critique is that I have no live performance to go on, but as she proved at San Remo is most definitely can song. The song obviously does not have to qualify for the final and I think that its style will really stick out on the night. It will do well with the juries and will appeal to the slightly older viewer who likes this more jazzy, sophisticated sound.

SONG – L'amore è femmina (Love is female)

ARTIST – Nina Zilli

COMPOSERS – Kristoffer Sjokvist, Charlie Mason, Frida Molander, Nina Zilli, Christian Rabb

LANGUAGE – Italian

UPDATE 4

Lots of official videos have been released this week.

GEORGIA – As revealed in and earlier update, Eldrine have a new lead singer, Sopho Toroshelidze. They have finally finished the new version of “One More Day” and the new song can beard in their brand new video clip below.




ITALY – the official video clip for the Italian Eurovision entry has been released. As well as showing Raphael and his trumpeter, it also shows inserts of a film. The song is slightly different to the one Raphael sang at San Remo it has been re-written with a few more lines in English, but is also still a bit too long.




FINLAND –We have not heard much from the Finnish entry since it was chosen back in January, however Paradise Oskar has released his official video clip. The video tries to focus on the environmental message of “Da Da Dam” as well as focusing on the artist.




UK – Just 2 days after the song “I can” was premiered on the BBC, Blue have released their pop video. The song is centred around the skyline of London, possibly with some very subconscious references to the upcoming Olympics. 2012 could be a very British year !




ROMANIA – It was way back on New Year Eve when Hotel FM was announced as the Romanian entry. They group has been doing a lot of promotion (as well as being involved in a minor sex scandal!) but they have finally released their promotional clip for the song “Change”. Like last years video, a lot of video trickery is used as well as being a ‘Visit Romania’ showcase!




ALBANIA – It was further back in December when Aurela Gace was voted as the Albanian winner for the ticket to Germany. However it was announced that an English version would be presented at the contest. The preview clip of the new song “Feel the Passion” has been released. The video shows lots of views of Albania whilst Aurelia, in a very strange dress flies about. Note also that the clip is still way over 3mins.




CROATIA – As suggested on the previous update, Daria’s song has had a total overhaul. “Lahor” was changed to “Break a leg” and that English version has been re-written to make the finalised entry “Celebrate” The track has been available for a while but the promo video has just been released. The clip has a party atmosphere as well as lots of costume changes.

ITALY

The Italian act for Eurovision was chosen as part of the annual San Remo Festival at the Ariston Theatre, whose final was on the 19th February.
The entry for Eurovision was chosen by a special jury from the songs in the final, so the song that won San Remo would not necessarily be the song selected for Eurovision.

The Eurovision entry chosen was “Follia d'amore” sung and written by Raphael Gualazzi. He had also won the Mia Martini critics award with this performance and song and most importantly he won the Televote for the Newcomers section of this year’s San Remo, meaning that he has the jury's and the public's support.

The song is a laid back jazzy number in the style of Jamie Cullum or Michael Buble. The song is very classy and feels very well thought out and professional and the song grows as it progresses. Raphael is quite a good singer, although his performance style is very insular it is one of the songs that immediately does not feel catchy but does feel familiar. The final 30 seconds is quite epic and makes the ending quite spectacular. The addition of the trumpeter at the side is very clever. A concern I do have it that the song is about 40 second over the Eurovision time limit. I would be very interested to hear what they do to try and shorten the song. There is quite a long instrumental part, which shows off Raphael’s piano playing skills but apart from that there is very little I would like to see be taken out.

There are two further things one must take into account, which can be linked together.
Firstly, San Remo has the advantage of a live orchestra, which Eurovision does not. The orchestra also helps to engage the audience and make the performance richer in sound. It will be interesting to hear who the backing track sounds like.
Secondly, there currently only 2 people on stage. I can image the addition of some ‘big band members’ or even possibly some dancers. Raphael, although playing the piano, seems to be a very inward performer and the song could be helped with adding some more performance qualities to it.

A very classy return by Italy but is it worthy of any points?


SINGER – Raphael Gualazzi
SONG – Follia d’amore (Madness of Love)
MUSIC – Raphael Gualazzi
WORDS - Raphael Gualazzi