The grand finale of the national Festival da Canção (Song Festival) is to take place on 4 March in Guimarães.

In a statement released on Wednesday, RTP said that it had “issued an invitation to 22 composers to present an original unrecorded song ", along the lines of last year’s competition, which was won by Salvador Sobral, with his performance of ‘Amar Pelos Dois’, composed by his sister, Luísa Sobral.

The list of composers invited to submit entries includes several musicians whose musical careers reflect their heritage in other Portuguese-language countries, such as Aline Frazão and Paulo Flores from Angola, and Tito Paris from Cape Verde. Other composers include Armando Teixeira, Benjamim, Bruno Cardoso, Capicua, Diogo Clemente, Diogo Piçarra, Francisco Rebelo, Fernando Tordo, Isaura, João Afonso, Jorge Palma, José Cid, JP Simões, Júlio Resende, Mallu Magalhães, Miguel Ângelo, Francisca Cortesão, Nuno Rafael and Paulo Praça.

To the original 22 were added two who entered an open competition organised by RTP raido Antena 1 - Peter Serrado and Rita Dias – while last year’s winning singer was asked to select another composer to add to the list, and chose Janeiro.

In all 346 entries were received for the open competition, with the winners selected by a panel chaired by journalist António Macedo and made up of Marisa Liz, vocalist of the bad Amor Eletro, Miguel Guedes of Blind Zero, Iolanda Ferreira and João Gobern.

The 26th composer on the list is Daniela Onis, who was chosen by the jury of the Antena 1 programme ‘Master Class’.

Next year’s Festival da Canção is to have two semi-finals, on 18 and 25 February, each with 13 songs. From each of these seven singers are to go through, for a total of 14 finalists.

The 2018 European Song Contest, in which singers from all over Europe are to take part, is to take place in Lisbon on 12 May.