If you sat down in front of the TV yesterday and watched the first night of the "Festival of Song," you contributed to the chart below, which shows RTSH's visibility compared to other television. The peak was after 22:30, when Elvana Gjata performed, with more than 14% of the audience. So, as the majority voted in an Anabel poll, the scant public interest in the festival was demonstrated the first night. Of course, the graphic is haunting, but rarely is it far from reality.
Greater interest was expected, given that artistic direction was in the hands of Vera Grabocka and Alketa Vejsiu for years engaged in bringing world-known formulas to Albanian screens. As their figures relate to dance performances, some commentators said they confused the "Festival of Song" with "Dance with Me." Moreover, Alketa felt at home as the sole moderator of the festival. She told her dozens of times that this was her dream for a long time and probably left the dream to take her too far.
The first night only 10 songs were sung at a festival that lasted two hours. We get an average of 3 minutes for songs and music by competing artists, resulting in only 30 minutes out of 120 in total. The rest is filled with presentations, performances by other singers, such as Gëzim Myshketa, Mahmood and foursome Stine, Marsela Çibukaj, Eranda Libohova, Redon Makashi, Luan Djegu and humor. How much blame can we have on commentators who joke about Alketa's monologues of a patriotic, inspirational, or nostalgic nature.
In early December, when he decided to respond to criticism of the festival, still unsuccessfully, Vejsiu said: "We're not making the festival to get trophies. We're doing it we want to do it. This is not the festival of Alceta, nor of the Summer, it is the festival of Albanians. That's my idea. I wish this could be heard and understood. ?But was it really Albanian? Was there anything different from the previous editions? The panel of four singers performing alongside Luan Zhegut is an exhilarated format that in the times of "Little Genius," the duo with Joy Musketa, however beautiful, remains a duet, ascending the stage of Mahmood - who is Italian rather than Albanian - there were problems with the audio and the lack of translation from italian.
During the comic sketch at the end, Rudina Dembacaj, Drilon Hoxha and Flor Binaj imitated Jozefina Topalli, Sali Berisha and Edi Rama respectively. You noticed the strange trio? Neither Topalli nor Berisha are the main topic of political life in the country. In fact, Topalli is mostly acclaimed for being a grandmother and Berisha for the weird theories he posts on Facebook. The common denominator of all this is the lack of actuality. The panel of four, the duo, the characters of the beginning of the decade, all belong to another time and can never be near the public today.
Along the same line of things done earlier is the scene that this year was pretty beautiful. There was no curse, but - unfortunately there is always one - the Italian screenwriter who performed it seems to have been inspired more than needed by the Eurovision scene held this year in Tel Aviv, Israel.
"More words than songs," writes one commenter on Facebook. "Alketa has become something monotonous that should take a long time for people to resume seeing people again," says someone else, and a third adds, "I look more like a press conference than a festival." Alketa said during the broadcast. clearly welcoming the public criticism we are putting down here for convenience.
The "Song Festival" changes hands every year and we can't expect the same from different people. At least it really is for Albanians who see it as fun and buy tickets.
