It feels like yesterday that Amadeus announced the winner as Angelina Mango, but the new edition of the Italian Song Festival is just around the corner, and expectations are high.
The first innovation is undoubtedly in the festival’s artistic direction: following five years of record-breaking editions, Amadeus is leaving the stage to TV presenter Carlo Conti, a veteran of the Ariston Theatre, who hosted the event in 2015, 2016 and 2017.
The choice of headline big names is fabulous. Rising from 24 to 30, these are the names that will compete for the sought-after statuette, including a few that are already making waves:
- Achille Lauro
- Gaia
- Coma_Cose
- Francesco Gabbani
- Willie Peyote
- Noemi
- Rkomi
- Moda
- Rose Villain
- Brunori Sas
- Irama
- Clara
- Massimo Ranieri
- Emis Killa
- Sarah Toscano
- Fedez
- Simone Cristicchi
- Joan Thiele
- The Kolors
- Bresh
- Marcella Bella
- Tony Effe
- Elodie
- Olly
- Francesca Michielin
- Lucio Corsi
- Shablo ft. Guè, Joshua and Tormento
- Serena Brancale
- Rocco Hunt
- Giorgia
The festival will be broadcast from Tuesday 11 to Saturday 15 February:
- 11 February: all 30 singers will perform, with voting by the Press Panel, TV and online
- 12 February: 15 of the 30 singers will perform, with Televoting and the Radio Panel
- 13 February: 15 of the 30 singers will perform, with Televoting and the Radio Panel
- 14 February: Cover Night, with the contestants accompanied by guest singers and evaluated by Televoting, Press and Radio. The outcome of Cover Night does not affect the overall result.
- 15 February: the Final, with performances by all 30 singers and the five with the most votes competing for first place.
But don’t expect the now-traditional all-nighters: another good idea from the new creative director is to end the evenings no later than 1 am; as well as the reintroduction of the New Proposals section as a separate competition from the Big Artists.
Following extensive speculation about co-hosts (including Conti’s great friends and colleagues Giorgio Panariello and Leonardo Pieraccioni), we now know one thing for sure: having presented the heats for Sanremo Giovani (the final is broadcast on Rai 1 on 18 December), Alessandro Cattelan will also head up Dopofestival, the talk show reintroduced by Conti, which will follow the action every night.
