Ready, set, GO! The marathon to end all marathons has begun! No, it’s not time for the Olympic games, we are talking about the 69th edition of Sanremo Music Festival 2019. Though getting through all of it might as well be an Olympic event. The first night gave us all 24 competing songs as well as clues on who the favourites might be going forward. So let’s take a look at what exactly happened!
And so our watch begins
Night one featured plenty of what we’ve come to expect from Sanremo: Interesting guest performances, long staircases and jokes completely incomprehensible to anyone outside of Italy. Back at the helm was last year’s host and artistic director: Claudio Baglioni, this year joined by Claudio Bisio and Virginia Raffaele.
Just like last year, all the artists took the stage and performed their competing entries. Not at the same time of course. That would just be weird. And noisy. Especially now that we had 24 acts competing instead of 20. For a full run through of who performed what (with links to each of the songs) take a look at the list down below:
- Francesco Renga – Aspetto che torni
- Nino D’Angelo e Livio Cori – Un’altra luce
- Nek – Mi farò trovare pronto
- The Zen Circus – L’amore è una dittatura
- Il Volo – Musica che resta
- Loredana Bertè – Cosa ti aspetti da me
- Daniele Silvestri – Argentovivo
- Federica Carta e Shade – Senza farlo apposta
- Ultimo – I tuoi particolari
- Paola Turci – L’ultimo ostacolo
- Motta – Dov’è l’Italia
- Boomdabash – Per un milione
- Patty Pravo con Briga – Un po’ come la vita
- Simone Cristicchi – Abbi cura di me
- Achille Lauro – Rolls Royce
- Arisa – Mi sento bene
- Negrita – I ragazzi stanno bene
- Ghemon – Rose viola
- Einar – Parole nuove
- Ex-Otago – Solo una canzone
- Anna Tatangelo – Le nostre anime di notte
- Irama – La ragazza con il cuore di latta
- Enrico Nigiotti – Nonno Hollywood
- Mahmood – Soldi
So how many made it through?
ALL OF THEM! Ain’t that nice? In fact every single one of these acts will make it through to the final Sanremo night on Saturday. Tonight’s voting was a three-way combination consisting of 40% public televotes, 30% press jury votes and 30% demoscopic (300 specifically selected fans voting at home through a special system) votes.
After approximately 482 four hours the acts were divided into three colour-graded categories based on how well they did in the demoscopic voting. Blue meant good, yellow meant a middling/mixed reaction and red meant a possible pee break for people watching the rest of these shows.
The acts in the blue zone were:
- Ultimo – I tuoi particolari
- Loredana Bertè – Cosa ti aspetti da me
- Irama – La ragazza con il cuore di latta
- Simone Cristicchi – Abbi cura di me
- Francesco Renga –Aspetto che torni
- Il Volo – Musica che resta
- Nek – Mi farò trovare pronto
- Daniele Silvestri – Argentovivo
The acts in the yellow zone were
- Federica Carta e Shade – Senza farlo apposta
- Negrita – I ragazzi stanno bene
- Paola Turci – L’ultimo ostacolo
- Enrico Nigiotti – Nonno Hollywood
- Anna Tatangelo – Le nostre anime di notte
- Patty Pravo con Briga – Un po’ come la vita
- Arisa – Mi sento bene
- Boomdabash – Per un milione
The acts in the red zone were
- Achille Lauro – Rolls Royce
- Mahmood – Soldi
- Nino D’Angelo e Livio Cori – Un’altra luce
- Einar – Parole nuove
- Ghemon – Rose viola
- Motta – Dov’è l’Italia
- Ex-Otago –Solo una canzone
- The Zen Circus –L’amore è una dittatura
One night down…
…Four more to come! If you thought a four+ hour long program featuring 24 songs and even more monologues was straining your eyes and willingness to stay awake, then let us tell you that this was only the beginning. Only the pilot episode of an extended Game of Thrones season. So get those refreshments ready if you plan on sticking with the festival until the end. We have a long and bumpy ride ahead of us and it will look a little bit like this:
Night two: Half the artists will perform their songs AGAIN. And once again the same voting system will be used: a combination of 40% public televotes, 30% press jury votes and 30% demoscopic votes.
Night three: The other half of the artists will perform their songs again. No changes to the voting system compared to nights one and two.
Night Four: The duet round! All 24 artists will perform special duet versions of their songs with known italian stars. A three-way voting system is used once again. HOWEVER, THERE’S A TWIST!
Yes, the voting will instead be made up of 50% public televotes, 30% press jury votes and 20% expert jury votes.
Night Five: The GRAND Sanremo 2019 final! All 24 acts will perform their songs…AGAIN and a top three will be determined based on the same voting method that was used on night four PLUS all the previous results from the past four nights. The winner out of those three will them be decided by a combination of 50% public televotes, 30% press jury votes and 20% expert jury votes.
FINALLY, a winner!
And that same winner will have first refusal at going to Eurovision. Should they say no, a more suitable act will be chosen from the other finalists by the organizers of the show. All that is certain is that one way or another, we WILL get to find out who will represent Italy at the Eurovision Song Contest 2019 and hope to equal (or better) Ermal Meta and Fabrizio Moro’s amazing result last year.
Did you watch the show tonight? Which song was your favourite? Have you ever gone through all 5 nights without needing a single cup of coffee? If so, TELL US YOUR SECRET!
Give us your opinion in the comments below and on social media @ESCXTRA and be sure to like our Facebook page for the latest updates!
