Operación Triunfo was a total success for Spain earlier this year. The contest drove impressive ratings for RTVE for three months and gave RTVE its best Eurovision ratings in years…despite Amaia and Alfred’s flop.
And now RTVE have launched the castings for Operación Triunfo 2018. A clause in the contestants’ contract explains that they may be picked to represent Spain at Eurovision.
Over the past few weeks, aspiring contestants were asked to send in a cover of any song performed in any edition of Operación Triunfo. And the people responded, submitting 10,000 videos.
The computer of Noemí Galera, the head of Castings and director of ‘La academia’, couldn’t quite handle it.
??Nuestra directora @NoemiGaleraN tiene un mensaje MUY IMPORTANTE que contaros sobre las #OTCover? Atentxs?? pic.twitter.com/TrCG2eSDxq
— OT 2018 (@OT_Oficial) May 23, 2018
In this phase, those behind the best covers were given a direct pass to the second stage of the castings. That may not seem particularly dramatic, but hey: the other option would be making the artists queue for hours under the sizzling Spanish sun in June, so no thank you.
In-person castings begin on Wednesday May 30 in Barcelona, and will conclude on July 10 in Madrid. The OT team, led by Noemí Galera will also visit Alicante, València, Palma, San Sebastián, Vigo, Tenerife, Málaga and Sevilla. Casi na pal cuerpo!
Then all of those who passed the covers segment and the in-person castings will compete against each other in a series of casting rounds. In the end only 18 will become part of the OT 2018 family. The livestream will return — and with it the world’s top trending items — and a new gala will air every week. WE CANNOT WAIT!
OT 2017: Relive the castings while you wait for OT 2018
Meanwhile, the official OT channel has been uploading the first castings of last year’s contestants. That, of course, includes Amaia and Alfred. Are you up for 30 minutes of a very tanned Amaia singing “Fly me to the moon”?
Or maybe you’re more into Alfred’s take on Salvador Sobral’s “Amar pelos dois”? His video shows how unique and different he is from the very first minute.
OT has proven gold for the Spanish broadcaster. Even though Almaia didn’t do quite as well as expected, Eurovision 2018 has been the most successful edition for RTVE in ages.
More than 7 million Spaniards watched the show — or 7,170,000 to be more precise — representing a total share of 43.5%. Manel Navarro only managed 3,918,000 viewers (a 27.2% share) in 2017, while Barei pulled 4,292,000 viewers and a 29.8% share in 2016.
The buzz generated during the show put RTVE back in the media spotlight — a place it hadn’t been in quite some time. Prior to OT, the Entertainment division of Spain’s public broadcaster felt as lacklustre as their staging at Eurovision. But now the glitter and gleam is back!
So what do you think of OT 2018? Do you think RTVE will pick its representative via the talent show? Should they do it? What do you think about Spain’s chances next year? And will RTVE finally get the staging right for Eurovision? Let us know in the comment section below!
I hope that people in Spain in OT 2019 will vote for best song , not for best love (fake )couple made only because maybe for win OT, Euroviison national final and maybe even Eurovision. Because fake love couple Aitana lost twice first in Eurovison nationa final (she had 2 songs in super final of 3 songs Arde or Lo Malo was better than La cancion ) and in OT final.
We need bops like Lo Malo for Spain next year if they want to finally get a top 15 or even a top 10
That’s great, but I want the minimum age for Operación Triunfo to be lowered to 16.
no
Why are your comments always about lowering minimum ages? I mean it’s good to have some young contestants don’t get me wrong, but it doesn’t mean that you have to always commenting about age. If you really want a bunch of youngsters competing or have a fetish on youngsters just watch Junior Eurovision, the adult version of Eurovision is not your thing.
I believe it was wrong for RTVE to ban 16 and 17 year olds from competing on Operacion Triunfo. 🙁
I hope they don’t miss the chance of sending a reggae bop this year, that’s all we expect and need from them.
Spain, well done on deciding to do OT again, this year’s competition was great
BTW I’m still angry that Lo Malo didn’t go to Lisbon, I hope there is another single that but even BETTER!
That’s the catch of it: OT is coming back, but it’s still not confirmed that it will serve as the ESC selection. At this point we can just hope that they won’t wait again until the competition is already underway to decide if it will… but then again, this is TVE, and to quote good ol’ Gil Pérez, “what kind of Spaniards would we be if we could not get the job done at the last minute?”
The “Big 4/Big 5” rule was established in 1999 and Spain was actually the first country that was kept from suffering from relegation. If we rank the top 4/top 5 since 1999 by average relative placing (i. e. 13th out of 26 countries in the final equals 0.5 and so on), this is what we get: 1st: Italy – 0.33 (which equals a 9th place among 26 contestants) 2nd: Germany – 0.59 (which equals a 15th place among 26 contestants) 3rd: France – 0.66 (which equals a 17th place among 26 contestants) 4th: Spain – 0.70 (which equals an 18th… Read more »
Hope to see Ana Guerra at Eurovision!
Spain really needs to give Europe some quality songs this year. In the last 10 years, Spain has been the weakest automatic qualifier, however, they have such brilliant music.
RTVE needs another Pastora Soler or Ruth Lorenzo to secure a top 10 placing for Spain. The same goes for my country (UK), I’ve just sent an email to the BBC about our recent streak of bad results!
There was quality in OT, and I wouldn’t say Spain is doing anything wrong – except maybe they should work a little on the staging (and even that was OK this year). This year Alfred&Amaia were simply a bad choice if a good position in the final was the only goal . I’d say “Al cantar” or even “Lo malo” would have fared better in Lisabon, but on the other hand, one should respect the choice of the nationals. Once everyone introduces “international juries”, it will be the end of any diversity in ESC.
We would flop again with televote with another Pastora or Ruth. We need to bring something more exciting.
I hope BBC will make some good move for your country 🙂
When you do something at Eurovision, you should try to be the best at it. Spain have something, but they don’t know what to do with it.
Just like”Tu Cancion”, that got outshined by “When we’re old” and “Together”.