Italy is on its way to choose its entrant for the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest while it enjoys its biggest music event. The 66th Festival Di Sanremo kicked of yesterday and tonight continues with the second night. The last ten Campioni singers and the first four newcomers along with a number of guest stars are included at tonight’s show.
Sanremo 2016 started yesterday and Carlo Conti with RAI can have a long sigh of relief. The viewing figures are out and the festival scored an average of 11,135.000 viewers and 49,98% share. That equals last year’s first night which had a share of 49,34%.
This year’s Festival is marked by the fight for the equal rights, even if no one mentioned it aloud. The Rainbow stripes were part of the performance of five artists (Noemi, Arisa, Ruggeri, Bluvertigo, Fornaciari). Laura Pausini talked about it saying “If we are alike we are all the same. We must protect ourselves. Not divide ourselves“. And then of course there was Elton John who is famous worldwide for his campaign for equality.
Ten more Campioni artists will present their songs at the stage of Teatro Ariston. Tonight we will have the first four newcomers contestants also. The second night of the Sanremo Music Festival will host after Laura Pausini another Italian superstar Eros Ramazzotti, who will sing a medley of his greatest hits. Ezio Bosso who is a composer and pianist will be on stage. Ellie Goulding will be the foreign superstar for today. Special guest stars will be the actress Nicole Kidman and the comedian Nino Frassica.
The ten singers performing tonight are:
- Annalisa – Il diluvio universale
- Alessio Bernabei – Noi siamo infinito
- Clementino – Quando sono lontano
- Dolcenera – Ora o mai più
- Elio e le storie tese – Vincere l’odio
- Francesca Michielin – Nessun grado di separazione
- Neffa – Sogni e nostalgia
- Patty Pravo – Cieli immensi
- Valerio Scanu – Finalmente piove
- Zero Assoluto – Di me e di te
During the first two nights the twenty big artists will present their songs. A mixed voting by televote and by the journalists in the press center (composed of accredited journalists that will follow the competition from the Roof hall at the Teatro Ariston) will vote the first two nights, but none of the competing acts will be eliminated over the first two nights.
The newcomers will compete into duels. Today will take place the first two duels between the Nuove Proposte section. The four participants are paired in two groups for the duels. The winner of each pair will qualify for the Nuove Proposte final in the fourth night of Sanremo.
Of course in the end of the night, as yesterday, we will have the results. The results, randomly showed on screen, will only reveal the four acts with the less amount of votes after tonight’s show, that doesn’t mean they are eliminated. However, this ranking and the coming ones on Friday, will contribute to the semi-final round result, where a mix of public televote, professional jury and audience will decide the four acts which won’t make it through to the final night of Sanremo.
The show will be presented by Carlo Conti, who also serves as the artistic director for the competition. Conti will present the show together with Virginia Raffaele, Mădălina Diana Ghenea and Gabriel Garko.
The remaining programme of Sanremo 2016 is as follow:
Serata 2: February 10th (Wednesday)
Serata 3: February 11th (Thursday)
Serata 4: February 12th (Friday)
Serata 5: FINALE – February 13th (Saturday)
You can watch Sanremo live at the official site of Sanremo at 20.30 CET.
Until then you can enjoy a compilation of the last 5 years of Italy in the Eurovision Song Contest. We did our best to find our greatest footage, and maybe you’ll see something you haven’t seen before.
