Spain: Alfred and Amaia want to go to Eurovision as a duet

by Sanjay (Sergio) Jiandani 1,234 views

Eurovision fever is hitting the sunny shores of Spain, as Operación Triunfo 2017 is drawing closer to its final phase and the Spanish national final is approaching. Only 7 out of the initial 16 hopefuls remain in the talent show now, the weeks are flying and the clock is ticking!

The 5 finalists of the talent show will battle for the golden ticket to Lisbon on 29 January.

Two of the hot favourites of Operación Triunfo (OT) 2017, Amaia and Alfred, have revealed that they would like to go to Eurovision together as a duet.

During their rehearsal, Alfred came up with the idea to go to Eurovision with Amaia; both singers even visualised themselves on the stage in Lisbon – she would be playing the piano and he would be playing the trombone with jazz style entry.

Their comments about Eurovision have set the Spanish social media platforms ablaze and gone viral. We must not forget that OT 2017 has become a massive phenomenon in Spain since its return to TVE.

You can see Amaia and Alfred’s discussion about Eurovision in the video below:

Amaia hot favourite to go to Eurovision

Amaia is the Spanish viewer’s hot favourite to win the OT 2017 and the Spanish national final; Spanish fans have baptised her Amaia de España (Amaia of Spain).

Her performance of Shake it during the 9th gala of OT 2017 went viral and trending topic in Spain, achieving circa 3 million views on YouTube.

The singer also won TVE’s viewer’s online poll with 36% of the votes.

Amaia performing Shake it!

National final date set

After last Monday’s show, only 7 hopefuls remain in the competition: Amaia, Alfred, Agoney, Ana Guerra, Roi, Miriam and Aitana.

The last 5 acts after the 2 upcoming evictions will battle for the golden ticket at the 2018 Spanish Eurovision national final.

On Monday 22 January we will know the names of the 5 finalists, the following day each finalist will be allocated his/her respective entry. Hereafter the competing acts will have from 22-29 January to prepare their potential Eurovision entries.

Spain will select its Eurovision entry and act on Monday 29 January via a 100% public televoting deliberation. The Spanish national final will be aired live at 22:35 CET on TVE 1, TVE International and will be streamed live on rtve.es

Operación Triunfo and Eurovision

Operación Triunfo kicked off in Spain in 2001 and TVE used it as the mechanism to select the 2002 Spanish Eurovision entry and act.

The first edition of the talent show was a massive hit in Spain, thus getting much exposure and mediatic coverage. Rosa Lopez was crowned the winner of OT 1 and won the golden ticket to Tallinn with her song Europe’s living a celebration.

TVE used the same format for the following 2 years in order to select the Spanish Eurovision entry and act: Beth (2003) and Ramon (2004).

TVE axed the show after its third edition. In 2005, Spanish private television channel Tele Cinco revived the talent show and aired a total of 5 seasons and had no link to Eurovision.

We must not forget that 2 of the participants of the 4th edition of Operación Triunfo went on to represent years after their participation: Soraya Arnelas (2009) and Edurne (2015).

Spain in Eurovision

Spain debuted in Eurovision in 1961 and has won the competition twice (1968 and 1969). The country enjoyed much success in its early days, but now seems to have had a reverse in fortunes. We must not forget that Spain has not made it to the Top 5 since 1995.

The Iberian country has only made it twice to the Top 10 in the last decade, namely in 2012 and 2014 with Pastora Soler and Ruth Lorenzo respectively.

In 2017, Spain selected its Eurovision entry via a national final leading to Manel Navarro‘s victory and winning the golden ticket to Kyiv with Do it for your lover. Unfortunately Spain came last in the Grand Final, continuing the bad spell of poor results in the competition.