The Sanremo Music Festival 1965 (), officially the 15th Italian Song Festival (), was the 15th annual Sanremo Music Festival, held at the Sanremo Casino in Sanremo between 28 and 30 January 1965. It was organised by Società ATA, concessionary of the Sanremo Casino and was broadcast by (RAI). The shows were presented by Mike Bongiorno, assisted by Grazia Maria Spina. Gianni Ravera served as artistic director.
Each song was performed twice, once by an artist from Italy and once by an artist from abroad. The winning song was "Se piangi, se ridi" written by Mogol, Gianni Marchetti and Bobby Solo, and performed by both Solo and The New Christy Minstrels. Solo went on to perform the song for at the Eurovision Song Contest 1965, held on home soil in Naples, achieving fifth place.
In January 2025, to celebrate the edition's 60th anniversary, RAI made the final available to view on their streaming service RaiPlay.
Format The festival was organised by Società ATA, the concessionary of the Sanremo Casino and held between 28 and 30 January 1965. Gianni Ravera reprised his role as artistic director.
The format stayed largely the same as the format from the 1964 edition. Each song was performed twice, once by an Italian artist and once by a foreign artist. Italian artists were limited to performing only one song, while foreign artists were allowed to perform two.
Voting system For the first two nights, the vote was conducted by twenty different juries with fifteen members each, proportionally represented between gender, age and social class. For the final, the vote was conducted by juries in sixteen different Italian cities, with four more juries set up in two schools, a university and a recruit training centre. The cities were chosen by random draw and differed in each show. Jury members gave one vote to five different songs. As in the 1964 edition, the votes from the first two nights were combined into one ranking, with the top twelve songs qualifying for the final and announced at the end of the second night. For the final, only the winner was announced, all other finalists declared tied runners-up and the full results kept secret.
Competing entries ATA received 242 song submissions from music publishers for the competition. An advisory commission chaired by composer Carlo Savina, composed of the seven journalists Giorgio Berti, Angelo Cavallo, Sandro Delli Ponti, Filippo D'Errico, Rodolfo D'Intino, Vittorio Franchini and Velia Veniero, narrowed down the list of submissions to thirty-five in November 1964. ATA then selected twenty-four for the competition in December.
Before the list of twenty-four songs was finalised, the record label RCA Records decided to withdraw their participation in protest of ATA not accepting all five of the songs they wanted chosen for the event, planned to be performed by their artists Paul Anka, Alain Barrière, Dalida, Neil Sedaka and Gino Paoli.
Among the competing Italian artists were and , who were given the right to participate after winning the 1964 edition of the Castrocaro Music Festival for newcomer artists.
Both the American singer Dionne Warwick and the English singer Julie Rogers were initially included on the list of competing artists released by ATA on 11 January, set to perform the songs "" and "" respectively, but their record label announced their withdrawal from the competition shortly after. Rogers was replaced by Kiki Dee, while Dusty Springfield took up "" as her second song in Warwick's absence.
+Competing entries Song Italian artist Foreign artist Songwriter(s) "" Ornella Vanoni Udo Jürgens "" Nicola Di Bari Gene Pitney "" Fred Bongusto Kiki Dee Fred Bongusto "" John Foster "" Ricky Gianco Jody Miller "" Gianni Mascolo Dusty Springfield "" Don Miko Timi Yuro "" Gigliola Cinquetti Connie Francis "" Iva Zanicchi Gene Pitney "" Bruno Lauzi Kenny Rankin Bruno Lauzi "" Betty Curtis Petula Clark "" Pino Donaggio Jody Miller "" Hoagy Lands "" Anita Harris "" Bruno Filippini "" Wilma Goich The New Christy Minstrels "" Robertino Danyel Gérard "" Johnny Tillotson "" Remo Germani and Audrey "" Bobby Solo The New Christy Minstrels "" Les Surfs "" Peppino Gagliardi Timi Yuro "" Dusty Springfield "" Milva Bernd Spier
Shows
The festival consisted of three live shows held between 28 and 30 January 1965. Each night consisted of twelve songs performed twice, once by an Italian artist and once by an artist of foreign origin. The shows were presented by Mike Bongiorno, who was assisted by Grazia Maria Spina. The television production was directed by .
During the first two nights, the songs were presented in groups of three, with foreign artists always performing their songs after an Italian artist had already done so. The running orders were determined by random draw, decided on the day they took place. For the final, all of the Italian artists performed in the first half of the show, followed by the foreign artists in the second half.
First night The first night took place on 28 January 1965 at 21:10 CET. The first twelve songs were performed.
+First night – 28 January 1965 Song Italian artist Foreign artist Result 1 "" Don Miko Timi Yuro 2 "" Gianni Mascolo Dusty Springfield 3 "" Betty Curtis Petula Clark Qualified 4 "" Iva Zanicchi Gene Pitney 5 "" Beppe Cardile Anita Harris 6 "" Bruno Filippini Yukari Ito Qualified 7 "" Remo Germani and Le Amiche Audrey Qualified 8 "" Wilma Goich The New Christy Minstrels Qualified 9 "" Franco Tozzi Johnny Tillotson 10 "" Pino Donaggio Jody Miller Qualified 11 "" Vittorio Inzaina Les Surfs Qualified 12 "" Milva Bernd Spier Qualified
Second night The second night took place on 29 January 1965 at 21:10 CET. The last twelve songs were performed and the twelve finalists were decided.
+Second night – 29 January 1965 Song Italian artist Foreign artist Result 1 "" Bobby Solo The New Christy Minstrels Qualified 2 "" John Foster Joe Damiano 3 "" Ricky Gianco Jody Miller 4 "" Peppino Gagliardi Timi Yuro 5 "" Bruno Lauzi Kenny Rankin 6 "" Ornella Vanoni Udo Jürgens Qualified 7 "" Gigliola Cinquetti Connie Francis Qualified 8 "" Robertino Danyel Gérard 9 "" Giordano Colombo Hoagy Lands 10 "" Fabrizio Ferretti Dusty Springfield 11 "" Nicola Di Bari Gene Pitney Qualified 12 "" Fred Bongusto Kiki Dee Qualified
Final night
The final night took place on 30 January 1965 at 21:00 CET. The twelve songs admitted to the final were performed again and a winner was chosen.
The winning song was "Se piangi, se ridi", written by Mogol, Gianni Marchetti and Bobby Solo, and was performed by Solo and the American group The New Christy Minstrels.
+Final night – 30 January 1965 Song Italian artist Foreign artist 1 "" Bobby Solo The New Christy Minstrels 2 "" Fred Bongusto Kiki Dee 3 "" Ornella Vanoni Udo Jürgens 4 "" Milva Bernd Spier 5 "" Wilma Goich The New Christy Minstrels 6 "" Bruno Filippini Yukari Ito 7 "" Vittorio Inzaina Les Surfs 8 "" Gigliola Cinquetti Connie Francis 9 "" Remo Germani and Le Amiche Audrey 10 "" Nicola Di Bari Gene Pitney 11 "" Betty Curtis Petula Clark 12 "" Pino Donaggio Jody Miller
Broadcasts Local broadcast The final night was broadcast on Programma Nazionale (television) and on Secondo Programma (radio) at 21:00 CET.. Only part of the first two nights were broadcast on Secondo Programma (television) starting at 21:15, while they were broadcast in full on Secondo Programma (radio) starting at 21:10 CET. In Italy, the final was broadcast on television to an estimated 17.2 million viewers, with the first and second nights broadcast to an estimated 15.6 and 14.1 million viewers respectively.
International broadcast The first half of the final night was broadcast via the Eurovision network in other countries. The festival was reportedly aired by broadcasters in France, Monaco, Germany, Switzerland, Czechoslovakia, Ireland and Portugal. Known details on the broadcasts in each country, including the specific broadcasting stations and commentators are shown in the tables below.
+International broadcasters of the Sanremo Music Festival 1965 Country Broadcaster Channel(s) Commentator(s) BRT BRT DFF DFF MTV MTV NHK NHK Yutaka Ishida 3YD TP TVE TVE RNE RNE JRT
Notes
References