LIVE: SANREMO 2013 - FINALE

For the last time, the fifth night in a row I will be live blogging Sanremo.... The 14 Big will be battling it out tonight, Andrea Bocelli among others will be guesting... After the performances we will have a superfinal with top-3 and they will re-perform their songs. The night will end with winning performance at 00.34. In theory :-) Join me!

20.50 Here we go let the show start! The night opens with Daniel Harding directing the grand symphonic orchestra of Sanremo in Teatro Ariston....Wagner it is. The first night started with Verdi, the opposite of Wagner, both celebrating this year. Classe 1813. A long but beautiful and interesting talk continues about music... anf´d then we go on with Verdi's Aida (we are in Italy after all! Certainly not Melodifestivalen....)

21.06 Luciana enters, maybe Eurovision inspired, dressed as a butterfly....  when Fabio collects himself the jury of qualità is introduced again. And then the present classification, based on the votes of the third night (counting 25% in the final result). Tonight's televote counts another 25% and the jury vote 50%.  Annalisa third, Modà second and Mengoni first in that one, as we remember. Meanwhile it has been leaked today that Mengoni will go for Italy in Eurovision 2013 in Malmö. That should be officially announced just before the declaration of the winner sometime tomorrow early hours.... :-) However the real winner of this festival is Luciana Littizzetto. Already much loved before for many years, now she has really blossomed and won over the whole nation, it seems. (Or should I say, developed into a beautiful butterfly in this case?)And this blogger was a fan before, now deeply in love!

21.15 We are ready for the first song, Raphael Gualazzi with his Sai (Ci basta un sogno).  He's currently in 5th place. The jury is surely going to push him up and if the televotes keep rolling in his might squeeze into the top-3 - unless the fans of reality shows keep likes of Mengoni, Annalisa and Chiara in top (and even Modà). This blogger doesn't warm up to this too much. Nice though. ***

21.24 Next we have Almamgretta with Mamma non lo sa, currently in the last place in televote. Hopfully their fans had a shock wake up and will vote for them tonight. I like this reggae song a lot, and Raiz's voice and surely this will be one of the songs I will listen out of this year's songs. *****

21.31 We go on with Daniele Silvestri and A bocca chiusa and his sign language translator. His at 9th place at this point, surprisingly low. Most likely to jump higher tonight both with televote and jury. The whole orchestra join in with the signs in the "mute" part of the song. Very good indeed. ****

21.38 Next we have Modà with Se si potesse non morire, currently at #2. The band has a very strong fanbase but also a very strong anti-Modà in Italy. Love them or hate them. I think their song isn't very strong, they have much better songs. The jury might put them down but the televote will be strong also tonight. **

21.44 A classic Sanremo moment: enters a top model, Italian this time for a change: Bianca Balti. And Luciana gets ferocious with her tongue... autsch!

21.50 And Bianca gets to present the next one: Simone Cristicchi with La prima volta (che sono morto) just to say in the theme of death after Modà. He's only 11th, also surprisingly low even if his performances have been rather shaky. But tonight he's on fire, so to speak. Very good. Quite funny lyrics, nice melody, light arrangement. Pretty good ***

21.54 and we move on straight to next one, Maria Nazionale with È colpa mia, 7th at the moment, surely helped by the whole population of Naples. She looks stunning in her light blue dress and sings very well this song full of Napoletan pathos. People of naples will surely support her also tonight, but will the jury buy this? Hmm... Me likes *****

21.58 And quickly to the next one, Annalisa with Scintille, currently at #3 helped by the reality voters. Will the jury drop her? Luckily she has changed her dress. The song is a typical Finnish "humppa" in my books and the only thing positive about it it's a bit different from the usual reality star repertoire. And she does a good job with it? But would I listen to it after this? No. **

After that Luciana has one of her monologues about pretty women and men who lust after them... LOL.  What is beauty after all, and how important is it? And then she asks an applause for all the not-so beautiful people who have made our life better.... Isn't she lovely?

Did I mention already that tonight's Melodifestivalen semifinal was the worst ever, me thinks. I wouldn't have sent any of the songs even to second chance, mind you the final! Yikes!

22.11 Little intervallo in Sanremo by dancer Luz Forster. With some Brazilian music. Luckily the initial Russian incluence turned into Brazilian after all in this edition of Sanremo! And apparently this was modern dance.... Buzzled...
22.16 The songs continue with Max Gazzé and his Sotto casa, at #10 at the moment, very much against the protests of the audience in Teatro the other night. He's to jump up tonight I guess. He has changed his circus director outfit to a vampire one plus added a blue contact lense. Maybe he can't see with it as he looks a bit lost tonight...  but he gets the whole Teatro Ariston cla their hands and go lolololololoo with him. They loved him, will the jury and televoters? I have kinda learned to like it, still only ***

22.21 Fabio has a present for Lucianina: rugby player Martin Castrogiovanni, 190cm, 120 kg... "Carne fresca senza grasso!!!!"

22.26 Back to music.. Chiara and Il futuro che sará, at #4 at the moment. Obviosuly helped by the reality show voters and fans. But she deserves to be up there as she's very good. The song has the crazy violin and retro-schlager feeling to it like so many songs this year. She should keep her position I guess, should be voted jury and televoters alike. ****

22.37 Marta sui tubi next with Vorrei, second to last at the moment. Clearly not understood by the televoters and I don't wonder or blame them. The intro with guitar is nice but what happens in between leaves me indifferent. Shame. *
Then Lucianina and Bianca change places with Fabio and make him walk down the stairs and praise his beauty and make a joke about the traditional way of professional man and useless leadies trying to be hostesses.... And how the women are treated on stage in Sanremo traditionally...Quite nice.

22.44 We go on with Malika Ayane and E se poi, scandalously only 12th at the moment. The jury will surely pushe her up a little but she might be way too low to get a good result this time. And I can't get over her blond hair (WHY??) The song is sweet and nice and I learn to like it more and more. The fans generally preferred her other song, but this is the one voted here, and then doing very bad in the televoting... Strange ****

22.50 Another comic on stage, Claudio Bisio. With tonight's first gay joke.... and politics, religion. Yawn.... And whenever this ends we will have the Elio's freak show on stage....

23.18 After having big heads, being darfs tonight they are fat. Elio e le storie tese I mean with their one note song La canzone mononota. Funny? No. And the song's funny elements are already gone... Time for a drink I think.... Only (luckily) 8th after the first night's televote. Can they climb up? *

23.24 Marco Mengoni finally. The possible winner and leader at the moment. He's also going to Malmö 2013 so will we have for the first time since 1997 Sanremo winner in Eurovision? Not with this song though, most likely. L'essenziale. I don't know what happened to him, after the first performance he's just gotten better and better! Me likes ****

23.29 Next Simona Molinari & Peter Cincotti and La felicità. Very good performance also from them, currently at #6. They can go either way tonight. Happy little tune. ***
23.34 Televote is closed now. Songs have been sung. It's over.

23.35 Here comes Andrea Bocelli, Sanremo newcomers winner 1994.... With his song Amos playing piano for him. He was born a few hours before Andrea was last on stage in Sanremo in competition, 1995. How touching... yawn... (You can guess I'm not a big Bocelli fan....)
Soon we will know the TOP-3 and an award for the best arrangement will be also given to someone.

Meanwhile in Latvia PeR has won the national final with Here we go... I don't remember one note of that song, so it surely wasn't among my favorites... :-(

23.52 Here we go again. Last guest star, Birdy singing Skinny love. Another fantastic choice for this Sanremo, amazing voice and song. I have very much enjoyed these singers, more than the usual Lady Gagas, Madonnas, One Directions that Sanremo used to have....
23.56 Time for the things Fabio and Lucianina will remember about this Sanremo.... with humor of course. Cute. .. and of course they burst out singing in the end. Fabio and Luciana have really been an amazing couple and great choice for this festival!
00.00 re-enter Bianca. And as Luciana can't sing or dance, she wants to learn to walk on a catwalk.... Poor Bianca...

An then she almost fell with her dress. That's Luciana when it happens...
Ok, here we go with the awards. Premio della critica Mia Martini goes to... voted by the press....

Elio e le storie tese! WTF? Ridiculous.... And for the best arrangement, voted by the orchestra.... It goes to....  Elio e le storie tese... I have no words..... :-( Oh well, the orchestra must have had fun playing the song and that counts more than finer things. Fun. It's important in life.
00.11 And now the top-3.....  ah no, pubblicità. Amazingly the broadcast is only 8 minutes delayed so far! :-) Bravo Fabio!

00.15 Back to Teatro Ariston.... The top-3 will be revoted with televote and the jury starting from zero. A superfinal indeed. And they are..... Elio e le storie tese..... sigh.... Modá... doppio sigh....  and last but not least.... Marco Mengoni who gets a HUGE applause! Now one can only hope he really wins tonight....
00.27 Televote reopened. The three superfinalists will reperform again. Elio has already lost all its charm in my books. Old joke. Dressing up as fat people doesn't help. Modà gets rather desperate and exited in their performance, or rather the singer. While the song doesn't go anywhere if not towards boredom after this many hearings....

And last but not least Marco Mengoni.... who gets again a huge applause, hopefully that means something! For me he's clearly the best out of these three. And mind you, I was never his fan and wanting him for Eurovision! He has won me over this week :-)
00.52 We are back and STOP! The televoting is over.... Marco Mengoni confirmed for Eurovision! :-) Not one word about the song though but that was to be expected, most likely it will be from his new album due to be released next month.

00.56 and the winner is.....MARCO MENGONI!!!!  Funny fact is L'essenziale was the very firs tsong presented in thsi 63rd festival of Sanremo, and also the very last - as a winner! :-)

In the end he got 44% of the televotes and 36% of the jury votes, MOdá 34-31 and Elio 22-33.