On Thursday evening on 12 December the final of the seventh X Factor Italy series was broadcast from the Mediolanum Forum in Assago, near Milan. This final had a special connection to Eurovision; 2013 Italian representative, Marco Mengoni, performed a duet with one of the four lucky finalists, Violetta Zironi.
Violetta was finalist in the Girls category, which was coached by international music star Mika. In the final, Violetta and Marco Mengoni performed Italy’s 2013 Eurovision Song Contest entry L’ Essenziale together. In the end, Violetta reached a third place, after runner-up Ape Escape (category Groups) and this year’s winner Michele Bravi (category Boys). Fourth place went to singer Aba from the category 25+.
Listen to the snippet of L’Essenziale below
During the final, all of the finalists performed duets: the group Ape Escape sang with pop-singer Elisa, who performed at the 2001 Sanremo Festival, while eventual winner Michele performed a duet with well-known Italian artist Giorgia, who participated in the Sanremo Festival in 1994 (seventh place in the category New Acts), 1995 (winning the contest as well as the critic’s award, following in the footsteps of Domenico Modugno), 1996 (third place) and 2001 (second place). Finally, Aba sang with artist Mario Biondi.
Winner Michele’s first single, La vita e la felicità, was co-written by Italian singer-songwriter and 1998 Sanremo participant Tiziano Ferro.
Marco Mengoni, 2013 winner of the Sanremo Festival with the song L’Essenziale, went on to represent Italy at the Eurovision Song Contest 2013 in Malmö, Sweden. With a shortened version of L’Essenziale he eventually reached a seventh place with 126 points.
