Sanremo Music Festival

hosted the Sanremo Music Festival between 1951 and 1976. In the aftermath of World War II, one of the proposals to revitalize the economy and the reputation of Sanremo was to create an annual music festival to be held in the city. In 1948 and 1949, two editions of an "Italian Song Festival" () were held in Viareggio, Tuscany, from an idea developed in 1947 by Aldo Valleroni. The competition was discontinued in 1950 due to financial problems, but it became the basis for the future Sanremo Music Festival. During the summer of 1950, the administrator of the Sanremo Casino, Piero Bussetti, and the conductor of the RAI orchestra, Giulio Razzi, rediscussed the idea, deciding to launch a competition among previously unreleased songs. Officially titled , the first edition of the show was held at the Sanremo Casino on 29, 30, and 31 January 1951. Twenty songs took part in the competition, performed by three artists only–Nilla Pizzi, Duo Fasano, and Achille Togliani. Two years later, in 1955, the festival made its first appearance on television, since part of the final night was also broadcast by RAI's channel Programma Nazionale. The last night of the show was also broadcast in Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and Switzerland. who was allowed to perform the song in any language. Between 1966 and 1971, entries were not forced to be interpreted by foreign artists, but double performances were kept. Starting from 1972, each entry was sung by one artist only. has hosted the Sanremo Music Festival since 1977. The only exception was 1990's contest, hosted at Sanremo's Palafiori. The competing artists were split for the first time into "Big artists" and "Young artists" during the Sanremo Music Festival 1974. The competition had one winner only, but the entries in the "Young artists" category had to go through an elimination round, while "Big artists" were directly admitted to the final round. The theater later became the usual location for the annual contest, hosting it every year except in 1990, when the show was held at the Nuovo Mercato dei Fiori, also known as Palafiori. In 1980, pre-recorded backing tracks replaced the orchestra, while playback performances were allowed in 1983 during the final round. In 1984 and 1985, all the artists were forced to perform in playback, while live performances with the orchestra were reintroduced in 1990. Moreover, starting from 1984, the separation between newcomers and established artists was marked, introducing two different competitions with separate winners. Only in 1998 were the top three artists in the newcomer section allowed to compete in the main competition. This led to the victory of the debuting Annalisa Minetti, which generated some controversy and led to the reintroduction of completely separate competitions starting from 1999. The distinction among different categories was abolished again in 2004. The following year, the contest included five different categories—Newcomers, Men, Women, Groups, and Classics. The winner of each category competed for the final victory of the contest. The category Classic was abolished in 2006, while starting from 2007, the festival came back to the rules used in the 1990s, with two completely separate competitions for established artists and newcomers. In 2009, a new competition, held entirely online, was introduced by the artistic director of the 59th edition of the contest, Paolo Bonolis. Titled Sanremofestival.59, the contest was not held in the following years. In December 2024, the regional administrative court (TAR) of Liguria ruled that the municipality of Sanremo could not directly appoint RAI as the organizer of the event, and that, starting in 2026, a public bid must be held in order to determine the organizing company. Two months later, RAI appealed the ruling, arguing that "[RAI's] branding is inseparable from the [festival's] format"; however, the Council of State later upheld the TAR's decision in May 2025. In early March 2025, the municipality defined the terms of the tenders to be held for the assignment of the 2026–28 festivals, which were published on 9 April, with broadcasters being able to apply within 40 days. Ultimately, the only applicant was RAI, bidding for the exclusive rights on the festival until at least 2028. Despite initial plans by RAI to move the contest to a different Italian location for the 2027 edition onwards, in order to avoid any further legal and financial issues with the municipality of Sanremo, it was later reported that the parties had reached an agreement to keep it in Sanremo until 2029. ==Winners==