Churky, Cláudia Pascoal, Mimicat, You Can’t Win, Charlie Brown, SAL, Esse Povo and Neon Soho will move on to the next stage of the 57th Festival da Canção and may compete for a place in Eurovision. The start of this edition, that is, the first semifinal, took place this Saturday night, in a ceremony broadcast live on RTP1 and conducted by Tânia Ribas de Oliveira and José Carlos Malato, with Inês Lopes Gonçalves in the green room and Wandson Lisboa dealing with social networks.
At the end of March 11th, pop-rock with woodwinds crossroadsfrom Churky, the minho scream I was born Mariaby Cláudia Pascoal, the theatricality of oh heartby Mimicat, with a sofa on stage and dancers, the party girl Mute Contrastby You Can’t Win, Charlie Brown and To liveby Sal – who share a member, João Gil, with fellow finalists You Can’t Win, Charlie Brown –, the first of the two selected songs that mention José Afonso, this one referring directly to “Zeca”.
These were the five songs scored in the traditional way. cement shoesby Esse Povo, the second to mention Afonso, the singer-songwriter whose death turned 36 three days before the festival, a formation created for the festival by Quim Albergaria, drummer/vocalist of PAUS and Bateu Matou, with his voice joining If that of Ola Ruth, Catarina Archer and Rafa Magalhães, it automatically went through, as the presenters explained, the telephone number of the public vote having been blocked in an operator for a long period of time.
Therefore, instead of the 12 songs that were planned, the final will have 13 songs in competition. The last consecrated one, the electronic pop of Endless World, by Neon Soho, a trio centered on the tremendous voice of Ana Vieira, was saved by the public, in a novelty by this year’s organization that increased the number of songs in the final and ensured that there were an extra 15 minutes of program after the announcement of the conventional winners, determined with a mixture of the votes of the public and the jury composed of Alex D’Alva Teixeira, Márcia, Pedro Ribeiro, Carlos Mendes, Sara Correia, Neev and MARO. Songs by Moyah, Bolha and April Ivy were also up for competition.
At the beginning of the festival there was still room for a medley of festival classics headed by HMB, starting with Winter sunimmortalized by Simone de Oliveira, later joined by other voices by Héber Marques, such as Nena, to take on He and sheoriginally performed by Madalena Iglésias, Wander Isaac, to One Big, Big Loveby José Cid, and Ana Bacalhau, for Fresh Water Love, by Dina and Rosa Lobato de Faria. All together sang too Loving for Twothe theme by Luísa Sobral that won the Eurovision in the voice of her brother Salvador.
Fernando Tordo also appeared to sing Bullfight, a song by you and José Carlos Ary dos Santos that took you to Eurovision in 1973, and to speak at the end. The mythical theme, which gave a preview of the 25th of April, is 50 years old, and the celebration will continue on stages in Lisbon and Porto. Blanca Paloma, the Benidorm Fest winner who will represent Spain at Eurovision, also performed an acoustic version of yaythe song that will be heard in May in Liverpool.
The second semifinal takes place next week, hosted by Sónia Araújo and Jorge Gabriel.