Alessandra Amoroso (Italian pronunciation: ; born 12 August 1986 in Galatina, Province of Lecce) is an Italian pop/soul singer. She was the winner of the 2009 edition of the Italian talent show Amici di Maria De Filippi. In 2014 she became the first female Italian artist to win the MTV Europe Music Award for Best European Act.
Since her youth, Amoroso participated in numerous local competitions, obtaining good results. In June 2007 she participated in a contest, Fiori di Pesco, singing the song Amor mio, and placed first among the competitors, and was rewarded by Mogol. When she was seventeen, she participated in the auditions for Amici but she failed.
On October 5, 2008, Amoroso passed the audition for the eighth season of Amici di Maria De Filippi, singing the single from Alicia Keys, "If I Ain't Got You". Rudy Zerbi, the chairman of Sony Music Italy, assigned three unpublished singles to Amoroso. She participated in the recording of the compilation disc of the programme, Scialla. "Find a Way" reached the fourth place in the charts, while "Immobile" reached the top position. During the program, the singer distinguished herself thanks to her voice: all the teachers, especially Luca Jurman, recognized a sandblasted timbre. On 25 March 2009, Amoroso was proclaimed winner of Amici di Maria De Filippi, winning the first prize of 200,000 euros. On the same evening, she also received the critics' prize, a scholarship worth 50,000 euros. With this money, Amoroso says she will continue to study with voice teacher Luca Jurman.