Oh oh-uh-oh oh... Time for San Marino!

The rehearsal

The second rehearsal of today was for song number 11 in the First Semi-Final, The Social Network Song (oh oh-uh-oh oh):

The singer Valentina Monetta is supported on stage by 5 backing singers and her laptop with which she connects to the social network that she loves so much: on the LED screens you can see her legion of fans!

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The backstage

We met with the San Marinese singer Valentina Monetta and her team backstage. "I'm very happy with the rehearsal and with my backing singers, I love you all and want to kiss you all"!

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The Press Conference

The composer of the song, the German Ralph Siegel, is a legend of the Eurovision Song Contest: "This is my 40th Eurovision Song Contest entry and the 20th international one". We confirm that his first composition to reach the contest was Bye Bye, I Love You which Ireen Sheer performed on behalf of Luxembourg in 1974. And it is the runner-up of the 1974 contest that Valentina would love to friend on Facebook, Gigliola Cinquetti from Italy.

Valentina Monetta is a hard worker. Thanks to this hard work she's able to keep on dreaming exploring the possibilities of being an artist: "It looks like dreaming is easy, but it's not like that, so to have this opportunity to go to Munich to Ralph Siegel's studio to learn this fresh and modern song was great. I felt it immediatly as my own!".

 I know that in the end this is a competition, but what I'm enjoying is to be up on a stage singing, having fun... that's my dream!
 

Ralph had the idea of the song with his own experience with Facebook: "I wanted to put some funny ideas about Facebook, this idea that you have so many friends and requests there that is stressing, but at the same time is beautiful to keep contact with friends".

About the change of title from Facebook to The Social Network Song: "it was not easy, we had to change after the decision of the EBU's reference group, and that involved record a new song, make a new edit of the video, new pressings of the promo material... and in such a short period of time", Mr. Siegel confessed.

A journalist asked Valentina how the song has affected her social network activity: "A lot. It is very important for my job, the communication in general, we all have many more possibilities through this".

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One of the authors of the lyrics, Timothy Touchton, explained that he was the only one in the delegation not to have a Facebook account: "I had it for 24 hours and then I realized it was going to take over my life, so I decided to erase it, it's a curiosity then that Ralph phoned me to write some lyrics about it".

Valentina put an end to the press conference by singing a capella to a bit of Una Giornatta Bellissima, one the songs from her latest album.