Italy haven’t had the longest Junior Eurovision history, but the nation began their Junior Eurovision journey with a bang. Their first every Junior Eurovision entry won the contest, but since then, the nation has stalled and often find themselves in the middle of the results table. This year the nation will be represented by Marta Viola who will be performing the entry La Voce Della Terra – will this be the nation’s second success story?
Song + Vocals
Although this year’s Junior Eurovision theme is Share the Joy, many of this year’s participants have chosen to speak about the environment in their entries. Italy is one of those nations, with La Voce Della Terra translating to ‘The Voice of the Earth.’ It is understandable considering the movement sweeping the world at the moment, but when it comes to Eurovision and Junior Eurovision, the message is a small portion of the overall package.
Although the message of the song is good, the song itself just doesn’t reach the heights of its competitors. I don’t find myself drawn into the song from the opening moments, and the melodies of the verses and choruses feel a bit bland. I feel that they tried to create a memorable and powerful chorus, but in reality I don’t think it comes across that way. This is also not the most contemporary entry of this year’s line-up, and I think that has stopped me from coming back to this song and hitting replay.
In terms of live vocals, this song still remains a mystery. As far as I’m aware, there’s no live performances of this song yet, nor do I know what Marta’s voice sounds like live in any performance. Based off the studio, there aren’t too many challenging moments with vocals through the song, so the few big notes in the song need to be hit live, otherwise it will become too monotonous. Saying that, this song could potentially come alive with live vocals, but that’s something we will find out once the rehearsals come around, and when the live performance is broadcast.
Act + Performance
We really don’t know too much about Marta Viola, and unlike many of this year’s acts, there’s no Voice Kids performances to get a feeling of her musical style. She could be a confident performer, but there’s also the potential that she will be overwhelmed on stage. It’s hard to know at this stage, and everything so far is based on the music video alone.
As for staging, I would suspect that the ‘save the Earth’ tones are translated into visuals. Italy aren’t a big prop nation when it comes to Junior Eurovision, so I think seeing Marta alone on stage is likely, backed only by the visuals on backing screens.
Conclusions
Italy are hit or miss at Junior Eurovision, and I personally have found myself liking every second entry they have sent to the contest. This falls into the miss category for me, and it’s one of the songs I enjoy least from this year’s line-up. It’s hard to comment on the potential results without getting a feel for the live performance, but overall I think it will fall towards the bottom half of the results table.
Rating
5/10
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