This Week: Spain's biggest singing competition, explained
Anyone remotely dialed into Spanish Twitter has probs seen their timeline taken over by chatter about the show Operación Triunfo, ever since last week.
Often abbreviated just as “OT,” the popular Spain-based reality talent show (think The Voice meets Real World) just kicked off its 10th season, and the appetite for a new slate of glitzy performances and dRaMa is high.
To explain the thrill of Operación Triunfo for our readers around the world, we chatted with BuzzFeed Spain’s Sandra Crespo Sanchez, who’s long covered the show and its dishy fandom:
First up: how exactly would you describe Operación Triunfo for people outside of Spain?
OT is a singing competition show. The live show is not too different from from The Voice or American Idol, but the main difference is that the contestants live together in a house and you can watch the live feed on YouTube. So you can see them rehearse their songs, learn and just get REALLY invested in their lives for as long as they’re in the show.
What makes this show so popular?
I think it’s a bit of everything. Music is obviously a big part of it, and because of the live feed you can see contestants evolve and get more confident with every rehearsal. But of course there’s also a lot of drama involved since they’re living together. Shipping random people together is a big part of being a true OT fan.
Wait, tell us more about the shipping. Do the contestants actually fall for each other?
The first season was back in 2001, and they had this huge thing between 2 of the final 5 contestants, Bisbal and Chenoa. Last season was the first new season we'd had in a while — that’s why it was so big. It had "Almaia" (Alfred and Amaia), "Aiteda" (Aitana and Cepeda), "Ragoney" (Raoul and Agoney)... those ships have been “real” at some point, but there have also been many platonic ones. There’s not a lot of drama apart from that. It really doesn’t feel like a competition at all — they all get along great and really support each other.
What are some of the most popular covers that have been performed?
“City of Stars” from La La Land, was huge. Even if you haven’t watch the movie, if you’ve watched OT, you know this song by heart. Amaia and Alfred sang it in week 5 and kind of started “dating” afterward — this song is one of the main reasons they end up representing Spain in Eurovision (the international singing competition) earlier this year.
My personal favorite is this cover of “Shake It Out” from Florence and The Machine that Amaia did last season. She was a huge fan favorite before, but this song really proved she deserved to win… and she did!
So the Season 10 premiere was last week, and you made a "Which OT 2018 Contestant Are You” quiz (Spanish here) to celebrate. Do you have a favorite yet?
Aaaaaaah, it’s still really hard to pick, we’re just starting to know them. I really like Julia and Noelia and Famous, but it’s way too early. At this point I still like all of them a lot to pick just one.
Finally, tell us a little bit about how you cover the OT for BuzzFeed!
We live tweet the show on Wednesdays (follow along @BuzzFeedEspana!), and afterward, we keep an eye for anything that might happen in the house.
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Curious? You can watch the show on the OT website here Wednesdays at 10:30 pm (Spain time), and check in on the contestants in the house on YouTube's live feed here.
For added OT goodness, Sandra recommends watching this clip from the premiere, which features last season’s contestants all singing “Camina,” a song that they wrote together as their anthem.
International Hits:
In Australia 🇦🇺 — Did you know Pharrell wrote “Hot in Herre”??? Or that these singers wrote all these other mega-hits for other singers??
In Brazil 🇧🇷 — Plan a date, and we’ll go ahead and let you know what the sex will be like (Portuguese here).
In Canada 🇨🇦 — All these Nicoles at the University of Calgary sound chill AF.
In Germany 🇩🇪 — Design flaws like these are what’s saving us all from living in an Instagram simulation (German here).
In Spain 🇪🇸 — What language should you actually learn, though? (Spanish here)
In India 🇮🇳 — Thoughts everyone has had while online shopping, ‘cause that shit is DANGEROUS, you guys.
In Japan 🇯🇵 — Further proof that dachshunds are god’s gift to us all (Japanese here).
In Mexico 🇲🇽 — Let’s taco ‘bout sex, shall we? (Spanish here)
In the UK 🇬🇧 — Do you have more of a Londoner’s or a New Yorker’s palate?
Required Reading:
Everything you need to properly celebrate that upcoming birthday/half-birthday/hey it’s been a very good Tuesday, hasn’t it?, via 14 Pictures That Show What Cake Looks Like Around The World. Someone get us a fork, plz?