How Amadeus turned Sanremo into a social phenomenon

Generations have been fighting each other since the dawn of time. Millennials will never understand Baby Boomers, Gen Z will always be in the opposite direction to Gen X, and vice versa. In Italy, however, there is one week a year when everyone, whether from '68 or 2008, gathers to discuss a historic event that will reach its 74rd edition in 2023: the Sanremo Festival. If in past eras it seemed that the kermesse had lost its relevance, in recent years it has turned into an event of monumental proportions, thanks to its new protagonists, to social media, and above all to Amadeus, the artistic director who has united the interests of two generations seemingly at odds with each other, creating a real cultural reset. On the brink of disaster, in 2020 the TV presenter was able to take the reins of the situation, and redirect the negativity felt by Italians at the time towards an intoxicating positivity shared throughout the country, by young and old alike. But how do you explain the online success of an art director who until a few days ago was still sharing his Instagram profile with his wife?

In an interview with Sole 24 Ore, his manager Lucio Presta explained the change in the Festival clearly: it is no longer about «old versus new,» but instead of «old coexisting with new.» This is the secret ingredient that has made Amadeus's Sanremo so intergenerational, being able to combine two demographics with the help of a vast knowledge of the music scene, and an expert focus on the world of teenagers. By inviting artists such as the Cugini di Campagna and Geolier, or Pooh and Mahmood, Amadeus keeps both elderly and the young glued to the screen, while the latter turn on the talk on social media. Similarly, the Romagnolo presenter's change, of course, has aroused the interest of Italian artists who would never have thought of revaluing the Festival, such as Salmo, who this week sang his Russel Crowe during the second evening: 'if you have singing talent, you don't go to Sanremo. Not many people might remember it, but Amadeus' early career, before coming to RAI, started behind a console in the 1980s. «As a great music fan, he has been good at putting together what his children like and what his parents like,» Presta explained, «to say: before Sanremo 2020 the Pinguini Tattici Nucleari were not known to the general public. Today they are one of the musical phenomena of the moment. Ama is good, he has an ear for these things».

While the music market was changing, in the wake of the advent of online streaming, the pre-Amadeus Festival still had its sights set on the results of songs on the radio. Between 2016 and 2019, the artistic direction of Carlo Conti and then Claudio Baglioni tried to introduce more radio-friendly singles to the Festival, but not enough to attract large audiences. Although the winning tracks in 2017 and 2018 - Francesco Gabbani's Occidentali's Karma and Ermal Meta and Fabrizio Moro's Non mi avete fatto niente, respectively - were catchy, they did not receive a good response on the Eurovision stage, coming ninth and last. Only Mahmood's Soldi ranked second at Eurovision 2019, demonstrated a real change of pace in the Italian music industry, becoming a clear example for future director Amadeus of how young people can create mass phenomena that are also useful for TV.

The data from last year's edition are overwhelming proof that Amadeus has managed to set the internet on fire: in 2023, Sanremo had a 66 percent share, generated nearly 30 million views on Raiplay, the Fantasanremo website was visited 253 million times, and there were 450 thousand Tweets and more than half a billion views on TikTok alone regarding the event's official hashtag. Also last year, in addition to dizzying numbers on social media, the first night of the Festival had severely affected seriously affected traffic on the Pornhub website. For some time now, the Festival has continued to remain relevant on social even weeks after its end, thanks to the memes that are revisited in new contexts on Twitter, and to the following that the artists bring with them even before they hit the Ariston stage. Assisted by the good fortune and gaffes that have punctuated the last few years of the Festival - let us cite, for the umpteenth time, the Morgan and Bugo feud, or the case of the roses kicked by Blanco - Amadeus has not only decided not to 'snub' the irony characteristic of social media during the week of the kermesse but has been able to reap the benefits by making the most of the phenomenon, establishing himself as the secret weapon of the Festival's rebirth.