It’s that time of the year again – the Festival di Sanremo has returned to the Teatro Ariston for its 74th edition!
The epic five-night competition to choose the best Italian song from a mix of established artists and emerging acts is not officially a national final for the Eurovision Song Contest, but the winner will get the first right of refusal to participate in the contest in May.
For the fifth year straight, our host and musical director is Amadeus, though he announced last year that this will be his last at the helm of the festival. His co-host and “super musical guest” for Night 1 was last year’s winner and 4th place finisher at Eurovision 2023, Marco Mengoni!
After a spirited opening display by the 4th Carabinieri Mounted Regiment and the arrival of our hosts onstage, the competition was under way – and this year things are a bit different. Traditionally, the first two nights of Sanremo feature half of the competing artists each night, but this year all 30 acts took the floor to perform their competing songs live for the first time.
Tonight’s performances were ranked by a press jury representing television, print, and online media. At the end of the night, these were their Top 5:
- Loredana Bertè – Pazza
- Angelina Mango – La noia
- Annalisa – Sinceramente
- Diodato – Ti muovi
- Mahmood – Tuta gold
Currently, Loredana Bertè is in the lead!
Other Highlights
Of course Marco Mengoni couldn’t be co-host without performing his winning song from last year, “Due vite” at least once. Later on in the show, he returned to the stage to perform a longer medley of his other hit songs like “Mi fiderò”, “Pazza musica”, and his 2013 Sanremo winner “L’essenziale”. Marco was hugely popular with the crowd, receiving a standing ovation both times he performed.
On the Suzuki stage, we got to see Lazza perform his 2023 Sanremo entry “Cenere”, which came in 2nd place last year. Then came a moving tribute to Toto Cutugno, the legendary Italian singer-songwriter who passed away in August, featuring his 1990 Sanremo entry “Gli amore”. Over on the floating stage, the rapper Tedua performed the track “Redlight” from the cruise ship Costa Smeralda.
So that was Night 1 of Sanremo! If you haven’t watched Sanremo before and are intrigued, the contest will be airing every night this week at 20:40 on Raiplay.it.
Do #YOU agree with the Top 5 ranking of the press tonight? Share your thoughts with us in the comments, at the Forum or @ESCUnited on Twitter!
