Various new details about Festival da Canção 2022 revealed!
Whoever runs Festival da Canção’s Instagram account has kept us on our toes today.
Earlier, RTP has revealed that, for the first time ever, Festival da Canção will take place over the course of a single week, with the first two semi-finals taking place on Saturday 5th and Monday 7th March 2022, with the final on the Saturday of that week.
This means that Festival da Canção will most likely be the last national final of the 2022 season, given it is just a week away from the song submission deadline and, unlike Melodifestivalen, which ends on the same day, tends to finish at about midnight.
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Not only that! In the last hour, the same account revealed which composers’ songs would perform in which semi-final, according to the results of a draw that took place today.
The composers were revealed on 4th November, 16 having been invited by RTP and Antena 1, and the other 4 having been selected from RTP’s online submissions process.
Here is the full list:
Semi-Final 1 (Saturday 5th March 2022):
Aurea, Fado Bicha, FF, Joana Espadinha, Kumpania Algazarra, Maro, Norton, The Mister Driver, Tiago Nogueira and Valas.
Semi-Final 2 (Monday 7th March 2022):
Agir, Blacci, Cubita, DJ Marfox, Fábia Rebordão, Pedro Marques, Pepperoni Passion, PZ, Os Azeitonas and Syro.
It has not yet been revealed whether the composers will also perform their respective songs, or invite other acts to perform them. The running orders have also not yet been revealed.
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Festival da Canção is one of the longest-running and most highly-respected Eurovision national finals, comprising 53 editions since 1964, and featuring some of Portugal’s most famous singers, such as António Calvário, Madalena Iglésias and José Cid, on its list of alumni.
The current multi-performer, multi-composer format was introduced in 2007 following several poor results from Portugal at Eurovision in prior years, and more recently, FDC has ditched its “Portuguese only” rule. Its most recent edition in 2021 saw the first ever winning song not in Portuguese, The Black Mamba’s prog jazz hit Love Is On My Side. They came 12th in Rotterdam with 153 points, placing 7th in the jury vote.
Who do you want to see represent Portugal in Turin? Let us know in the comments and on social media.
