Italy has its song for Basel 2025! Lucio Corsi will perform 'Volevo Essere Un Duro' at the 69th Eurovision Song Contest.

On Saturday 22 February, Italian broadcaster Rai revealed that Tuscan singer-songwriter Lucio Corsi will be flying the Italian flag at the Eurovision Song Contest in May.

One week on from the song achieving the runner-up position at the 75th edition of Italy's prestigious Festival di Sanremo , Volevo Essere Un Duro now earns the honour of becoming Italy's next Eurovision entry.

13,427,000 people watched the Sanremo 2025 final in Italy, giving it a 73.1% TV audience share.

After a starting field of 29 songs and 5 nights of peformances, it came down to a Top 5 'superfinal' in the early hours of Sunday 16 February. After one final vote had taken place, it was just 0.4% which separated the Sanremo winner (Olly's Balorda Nostalgia ) and second-placed Volevo Essere Un Duro by Lucio Corsi.

Olly declined the opportunity to represent Italy at Basel 2025, citing a need to focus on what was already a busy schedule of work and touring ahead of him this summer. Broadcaster Rai extended the invitation to Lucio, who has accepted the honour of singing for his country in May.

Lucio Corsi

Lucio Corsi is a 31-year-old singer-songwriter from Tuscany, originally from Val di Campo di Vetulonia. After playing guitar in several local bands, he moved to Milan in 2012 and embarked on a solo career, writing and performing his own songs in Italian.

In 2015, he released his first two EPs, Vetulonia Dakar and Altalena Boy . Two years later, he followed these up with his debut album, Bestiario Musicale , a concept record inspired by the animals of his homeland, the Maremma.

In 2020, he signed with Sugar Music and released his second studio album, Cosa Faremo Da Grandi? , co-produced with Francesco Bianconi and Antonio Cupertino. The album was accompanied by the visionary work of director Tommaso Ottomano, with whom he continued to collaborate on his 2023 album, La Gente Che Sogna ; a record that embraced the sounds of 1970s glam rock, a longtime passion of Lucio's, while exploring themes of dreams, night and imagination.

In November 2024, Lucio returned with the new single Tu Sei Il Mattino , a song that plays a key role in series three of Paramount+'s hit TV show Vita da Carlo .

Sanremo 2025

The 75th edition of Festival di Sanremo reached some notable new highs in terms of reach.

Rai’s Sanremo -related content generated 72% of total social-media video views, domestically, among broadcasters and streamers while the show was airing. The competition was also responsible for 63% of interactions.

On TikTok, Rai’s Sanremo -dedicated accounts fuelled this impressive growth, with a +131% increase in interactions. Across all social media platforms, Rai’s Sanremo accounts gained over 570,000 new followers, reaching a total of over 4 million. Sanremo 2025 can also lay claim to being the youngest edition ever! 66% of the official account's reach on Instagram was to users aged between 14 and 35 years old.

And on television, there was further ground broken! The 2025 edition of Sanremo was broadcast in native 4K SSR live – a major milestone for the long-running show's audiovisual quality.

Italy at the Eurovision Song Contest

The inaugural Eurovision Song Contest took its inspiration from Festival di Sanremo (the Italian song festival), so it’s no surprise that Italy took part in the very first Contest back in 1956.

Their first victory came in 1964 when Gigliola Cinquetti stormed the scoreboard in Copenhagen with Non Ho L'età , receiving nearly three times as many points as the runner-up.

In 1990, Toto Cutugno won the Contest with European unity anthem Insieme: 1992 , and when the show was organised by Radiotelevisione Italiana (RAI) the following year, Toto would co-host alongside fellow victor Gigliola. Allora!

In 2021, the Italians struck gold once more with alt-rock band Måneskin and their self-penned track Zitti E Buoni (‘Shut Up and Behave’) which became a global streaming hit, along with their follow-up song I Wanna Be Your Slave and a cover of The Four Seasons' Beggin’ .