Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

The summer is ending even in Italy (maybe not weatherwise...) and people's favorite past time is here: gossip. And if it's about Sanremo even better. The first name given as certain to be participating in next year's festival is Gino Paoli. He's a youngster of 76. The winner of 2011 edition Roberto Vecchini (68) is a baby compared to him and he wouldn't figure out even among the Buranovskiye Babushki... This said the man has a remarkable career that covers already seven decades and one of his best known songs is from 1959, Il cielo in una stanza . Dozens of versions have been recorded ever since Mina made the song a hit until these days by Carla Bruni Sarkozy , Franco Battiato , Mike Patton of Faith No More and others. Another classic is  Sapore di sale .  This would be his sixth Sanremo following the participations of 1961, 1964, 1966, 1989 and 2002 where he came third with Un altro amore . His latest album is from 2009.  The names of ...

Ex-Eurovision star Gianni Morandi will do a bis and host also Sanremo 2012 as he did with success in 2011. Not else is known about next year's edition so far as only recently RAI and the city of Sanremo managed to make a deal hosting the contest once again in the beforementioned city. An argument that seems to go on every year... Could you have Sanremo somewhere else but Sanremo really? Perche Sanremo è Sanremo! Sanremo 2011 was won by veteran Roberto Vecchioni followed by Modà with Emma and another veteran and Eurovision veteran as well, Albano .

Roberto Vecchioni aka Il Professore (67) or the poet wins the 61st Sanremo festival with his beautiful Chiamami ancora amore . Quite a change after the last two editions won by reality-TV stars Marco Carta (26) and Valerio Scanu (21) - a needed change to restore the credibility of the contest. He also won the critic's Mia Martini award Roberto Vecchioni released his first album in 1971 and his latest, 31st this week. He has also released 8 books so far and written songs for other artists since the 1960's. He is of Napoletan origin but grew up in Milan. He hit it big in mid 1970's with Samarcanda . In Sanremo he participated only once before as an artist, in 1973 with L'uomo che si gioca il cielo a dadi (7th) but he has written two other entries: in 1968 Sera for Gigliola Cinqueti (8th) and in 1985 A lei for Anna Oxa (7th) He won with 48% of the televotes against 40% of Arriverá by Modá and Emma. Albano came third with 12% for his Amanda è libera . The final night sco...

And just about in time! What is Sanremo without a scandal? Nothing. In a press conference. The guy who's in charge for the televoting said Roberto Vecchioni is leading the televoting when it is ment to kept secret. The direector of RaiUno and Morandi got angry of course and Morandi left the conference with the infamous "Vaffan...". It was also revealed that Micaela won the televote for the newcomers but the jury vote put Raphael Gualazzi ahead of her. And it's not all, Robbie Williams made a scene as well. Take That came to rehearsals one hour late and Morandi asked "Where have you been?". Long story short Robbie took off and Morandi was running after him trying to make things right. In the end Elisabetta Canalis convinced Robbie to perform at all in one condition: Morandi should be nowhere around! Oh dear... Here's The Flood last night. Meanwhile the share driopped to 46,91% or 10.616.000. In all this is the most succesful edition in many years with th...

The first names are out for Sanremo 2011. Gianmarco Mazzi, artistic director gave these names for sure: Nina Zilli, Max Pezzali, Anna Oxa, Roberto Vecchioni and Emma Marrone. Nina Zilli, the moral winner of newcomers 2010 where she came 2nd behind Tony Maiello returns for a revenge. She has had a very succesful year. Max Pezzali, ex-883 debuts as soloist but he did Sanremo already in 1995 with 883. Anna Oxa tries a comeback and this will be her 14th Sanremo. Two victories (one with Fausto Leali though), two second places and nine top-10 placings but her latest participation in 2006 didn't go that well... . Roberto Vecchioni returns after 38 years, his one and only previous participation is from 1973. Emma Marrone, yet another star from Amici talent show will be with group Modá as widely speculated or solo. Another Amici, Alessandra Amoroso is also highly tipped to be there.