Rumour: Will ABBA’s Agnetha be in Malmö?

Malmo 2013 – Rumours are mounting that ABBA’s Agnetha Fältskog may be making an appearance at this year’s Eurovision Song Contest. Agnetha, now aged 62 and one quarter of Sweden’s most famous band ABBA, has just released a new single ‘When You Really Loved Someone‘. A new album entitled ‘A‘ is due for release on 13th May (Eurovision week).

A History of France at the Eurovision Song Contest

France – A history of France in the contest can be found here! We know the stereotype of the woman-ballad entry from France but Jessy Matador, Sébastien Tellier or Anggun have proven that there was more to France than the archetype. But it’s  rooted deep in French history that there are two sides battling for the leadership for France. See here why and how!

Eurovision History Chat with Bell and Freeman: Germany

  ESC History Podcast – The story of Germany in the Eurovision Song Contest is not one of dominating glory. Just two victories in more than half a century of trying. But it is an engrossing tale. It’s in part about a nation’s cultural redemption The first ESC was 11 years & 16 days after the end of the european war. The other part of the story is about the battle for the soul of German popular culture. For years modernity went head to head with the sweet & highly sentimental schlager style.

Eurovision History Chat: Yugoslavia

  ESC History Chat – 20 years ago, the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia began its breakup culminating in the eventual independence of all its former member republics, most of which have joined Eurovision as independent countries. Within Eurovision, Yugoslavia, as a Communist country that looked West while many of its neighbours looked East, provided a

Eurovision History Chat: Norway

  Eurovision Podcast – Norway has been a Eurovision ever present since 1960 when the beloved Voi Voi announced its presence to the rest of the continent. As you will hear in this podcast, the Norwegians have scaled the heights and plumbed the depths since them. Their FOUR “nul points” have saddled them with a reputation for naffness, this is most unfair. Norway’s public broadcaster is Norsk Rikskringkasting or NRK. Some Eurovision types might argue that the acronym means

Full Videos of All Eurovision Song Contests from 1956 to 2003 on YouTube

  Eurovision – It’s an early christmas present for Eurovision fans: Full Videos of all Eurovision Song Contests from 1956 up to 2003 have been uploaded on YouTube. Especially younger fans will now be able to experience the special moments and greatest victories of their favourite contest. The YouTube user Euroensiklopediya has not uploaded all Eurovision Song Contests but also all editions of the Junior Eurovision Song Contest and the Eurovision Dance Contest.

ESC History: First song ever performed on Eurovision

ESC History – Did you know that the first song ever performed at a Eurovision Song Contest was “De vogels van Holland” by Jetty Pearl from the Netherlands? It was 1956 in Lugano, Switzerland, when 7 countries started the tradition that today is one of the biggest media events each year. Just this first year each participating country entered 2 songs into the competition. The winner was of course Lys Assia, who adorns the logo of this series.

Here is the historic song:

ESC History: Carola the ‘little witch’

Sweden – The Eurovision Song Contest 1991 in Rome ended in a tie. Sweden’s “Carola” and France’s “Amina” had both received 146 points. Carola was the sole winner tough, as the rules at that time stated, that the song having received more top marks (12 points) was the winner. When the final result appeared on the scoreboard with France and Sweden both leading, the supervisor of the EBU Frank Naef had to clarify the situation. After he had declared Carola as the winner, he obviously forgot that his microphone was still turned on and commented:

ESC History: Garbage bags for Switzerland

Switzerland – In the current dry spell (Eurovision news-wise) we will look into a little Eurovision history once again: 1979 was an interesting year in ESC History: Germany sent a gang of crazy people (seemingly) from Mongolia to Jerusalem and Israel won the second time in a row. But Switzerland surpassed even Germany in bizarreness that year. Peter, Sue &Marc (who represented Switzerland a total of 4 times) engaged comic trio Pfuri, Gorps and Kniri, who used garbage bags, watering cans and garden hoses to provide the background music. Unsurprisingly the lyrics of their song “Trödel und co” told everyone how easy it is to use all

55 years ago today ‘Eurovision’ was born

EBU – October 19, 1955: At a meeting in the Palazzo Corsini in Rome the EBU General Assembly agreed to the organizing of a “European Grand Prix” to be held in Lugano in the spring of 1956. The Eurovision Song Contest, that would become the biggest music event on the planet was born.In the January of that same year, Marcel Bezençon, the president of the EBU Programme Commitee, had approved a project called “European Song Contest”,

ESC History: How a Eurovision song started a revolution

Portugal – The 19th Eurovision Song Contest 1974 in Brighton was an important one in every respect. Not only did four young Swedes start their worldwide career there, which made them the most successful band Eurovision ever “produced”, but another song became important in a political sense. During the contest “E depois do adeus” by Paulo de Carvalho didn’t impress a lot of judges. The song came shared last (along with Switzerland, Germany and Norway) with only 3 points. 18 days later the song would start a revolution in the country by

ESC History: Corinna May gets disqualified in 1999

Do you remember when Corinna May was disqualified from representing Germany in 1999?

Corinna May had won the national final with her anthem “Hör den Kindern einfach zu” (Just listen to the children) in front of Sürpriz, who eventually represented Germany in Jerusalem that year. What had happened?

Did you know (2)…

…  that Lohengrin Filipello, the very first host of the Eurovision Song Contest in 1956, is still the only male host, who presented the entire show by himself?

After the first edition mostly women hosted the show and only in the 80s the tradition of a male and a female host presenting the show

Did you know (1)…

… that Israel is the only winner not to participate the next year?

Israel had won the contests in 1978 with “Yizhar Cohen & Alpha Beta” and “A-Ba-Ni-Bi” and in 1979 on home ground with “Milk & Honey with Gali” and “Hallelujah”. Because of financial difficulties they did not only give the right to host the next event to the Netherlands, but also decided not to participate at all. To this day,

ESC History 5: Boycott in 1970

Do you remember, when many countries boycotted the contest?

In 1970 all the Scandinavian countries, Austria and Portugal boycotted the event because of the voting system. The year before in 1969 4 countries had been declared winner: the Netherlands, Spain, France and the United Kingdom. All of these 4 had received 18 points. This peculiar situation meant that 25% of the participants had won the competition. Many countries demanded a change of the voting system after this incident but

ESC History 4: Sweden wins with a margin of 0 points

Do you remember when Sweden won with a margin of … no points.

It was 1991 in Rome. Sweden and France had fought a tough fight during the voting. When the last jury had announced their votes, Carola from Sweden and Amina from France had the same amount of points (146). According to the rules of the EBU at that point Sweden was declared the winner as Carola had gotten more 10 pointers than Amina (both had also achieved the same amount of 12 points). Had the rules of the EBU today been valid in 1991 France would’ve won, as now the number of countries you got at least 1 point from is the important figure in case of a tie, not the number of 12 points.

ESC History 3: A host loses her dress

Do you remember when a Swedish host lost her dress?

It was 1985 in Gothenburg, Sweden. Lill Lindfors was the host of the evening. Many see her as the best host ever, because of this little performance at the beginning of the voting procedure:

ESC History 2: Spanish entry with problems

Do you remember when a Spanish entry had some problems?

No, no! I’m not talking about this year, when Jimmy Jump “crept” into the Spanish presentation at the Eurovision Song Contest 2010. 20 years earlier the Spanish duo “Azucar Moreno” had the starting position number 1  in Zagreb and had huge acoustical problems. The conductor looked confused when the rhythmic playback

ESC History (1): Nicole sings reprise in 4 languages

Do you remember when Germany won and sang the reprise in 4 languages?

It was 1982 in Harrogate in the United Kingdom. Germany had just achieved their first victory after 27 years of unsuccessful participation. Nicole (18) started to sing the reprise. First in the normal German version, then in English, French and Dutch and thus in the languages of Germany’s former enemies. This was not planned at all, which is funnily proven by the backing singers going on to sing their lines in German .

BTW: Austria gave Germany 1 point. A fact that would go down into Eurovision history.