Last month, Albania selected their Eurovision entrant through the annual music festival Festivali i Këngës: Ronela Hajati will represent the country with her song “Sekret”. As is common for Albania, the song will be revamped before the contest. Having flown to London to record the revamp, she has teased details via her Twitter.
In a TV interview earlier this month, Ronela expressed that she wanted to work with London-based producer Diztortion on the revamp, who has worked with artists such as Shakira and David Guetta. Since then, she has taken to her Twitter to update fans on the progress on the revamp.
Although recording of the revamp isn’t quite finished, she has dropped several hints of what we can expect. She is hoping to release the revamp in March, but has yet to record the music video.
So far, through her interview and recent tweets, we know the following:
- There will be more English introduced to the lyrics, but Albanian language will remain
- “Ta marrsha” will remain
- The high note remains
- Elements of the intro remain, but it will be shorter
- The eagle remains
- Folk instrumentation will remain in the production
While the revamp isn’t quite finished yet, she has posted a 11 second snippet of the new sound:
Albania and Eurovision revamps
Albania participated in the Eurovision Song Contest for the first time in 2004. The country’s best result was reached in 2012, when Rona Nishliu placed 5th with her powerful Albanian language ballad “Suus”.
In the 10s, Albanian Eurovision revamps became notorious for stripping Festivali i Këngës entries of their Albanian lyrics and instrumentation, and often resulting in non-qualification (see: 2014, 2016 and 2017). However, since 2018, Albania has qualified for the Grand Final with entries fully in Albanian.
In 2021, Anxhela Peristeri won the Festivali i Këngës 59 with the song “Karma”. Albania qualified for the Grand Final and placed 21st with 57 points overall. Will Ronela make it four years in a row?
Are you excited about Albania’s revamp? Let us know! Be sure to stay updated by following @ESCXTRA on Twitter, @escxtra on Instagram and liking our Facebook page for the latest updates! Also, be sure to follow us on Spotify and YouTube to see our reactions to the news in the run up to Turin 2022!
