Eurovision Song Contest 1977

The Eurovision Song Contest 1977 was the 22nd edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. It took place in London, United Kingdom, following the country's victory at the 1976 contest with the song "Save Your Kisses for Me" by Brotherhood of Man. Organised by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and host broadcaster British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), the contest was held at the Wembley Conference Centre on Saturday 7 May 1977, marking the first time the event took place in the month of May since the first contest in 1956.[1] The contest was hosted by English journalist Angela Rippon.

Eurovision Song Contest 1977
Dates
Final7 May 1977
Host
VenueWembley Conference Centre
London, United Kingdom
Presenter(s)Angela Rippon
Musical directorRonnie Hazlehurst
Directed byStewart Morris
Executive supervisorClifford Brown
Executive producerBill Cotton
Host broadcasterBritish Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)
Opening actAn aerial tour of the four constituent countries of the United Kingdom
Interval actAcker Bilk and his Paramount Jazz Men
Websiteeurovision.tv/event/london-1977
Participants
Number of entries18
Debuting countriesNone
Returning countries Sweden
Non-returning countries Yugoslavia
Participation map
  •      Participating countries     Countries that participated in the past but not in 1977
Vote
Voting systemEach country awarded 12, 10, 8-1 points to their 10 favourite songs
Nul points in finalNone
Winning song France
"L'oiseau et l'enfant"

Eighteen countries participated in the contest; Sweden returned after its absence from the previous edition, while Yugoslavia decided not to enter.

The winner was France with the song "L'oiseau et l'enfant", performed by Marie Myriam, written by Joe Gracy, and composed by Jean-Paul Cara. The United Kingdom, Ireland, Monaco and Greece rounded out the top five. Greece's fifth place finish was their best result up to that point. France' fifth win was also a record at the time, and one that France held onto for six years, until being equalled by Luxembourg in 1983.

Location

London is the capital city of England and the United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in Europe by most measures. London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history goes back to its founding by the Romans, who named it Londinium.[2]

Wembley Conference Centre was chosen to host the contest. The venue was the first purpose-built conference centre in the United Kingdom, and opened on 31 January 1977 - making it a newly built venue at the time. It was demolished in 2006.

Format

The language rule was brought back in this contest, four years after it had been dropped in 1973. However Germany and Belgium were allowed to sing in English, because they had already chosen the songs they were going to perform before the rule was reintroduced.

This was most possibly the Eurovision with the most scoring mistakes, as the scrutineer Clifford Brown had to stop the host Angela Rippon several times to correct the scores. For the first time in the contest's history, the flags of the competing nations were displayed on the scoreboard next to the country's name.

Participating countries
Further information: List of countries in the Eurovision Song Contest

Tunisia was set to participate in the contest and had been drawn to participate in fourth place, but later withdrew.[1] Yugoslavia decided not to enter this contest and would not return to the contest until 1981, while Sweden returned to the competition, having missed out the year before.[3] This made for eighteen participating nations.

The Belgian act Dream Express had created some controversy in the press with reports that the three female members would wear transparent tops; this did not materialise for the actual event.[4]

The British conductor Ronnie Hazlehurst used an umbrella and wore a bowler hat during the UK entry.[5][6]

Conductors

Each performance had a conductor who led the orchestral accompaniment.[7][8]

Returning artists
Artist Country Previous year(s)
Michèle Torr  Monaco 1966 (for  Luxembourg)
Beatrix Neundlinger and Günter Grosslercher (as part of Schmetterlinge)  Austria 1972 (as part of The Milestones)
Patricia Maessen, Bianca Maessen, and Stella Maessen (as part of Dream Express)  Belgium 1970 (for  Netherlands as Hearts of Soul)
Ilanit  Israel 1973
Fernando Tordo (as part of Os Amigos)  Portugal 1973
Paulo de Carvalho (as part of Os Amigos)  Portugal 1974
The Swarbriggs  Ireland 1975

Results

The following tables reflect the final official scores, verified after the contest transmission. During the voting sequence of the live show, several errors were made in the announcement of the scores, which were then adjusted after the broadcast. Both Greece and France duplicated scores, awarding the same points to multiple countries. From the Greek scores, The UK, Netherlands, Austria and Finland all had 1 point deducted after the contest and from the French scores, Austria, Germany, Israel, Italy and Belgium all had 1 point deducted. None of the adjustments affected the placing of any of the songs.

Draw Country Artist Song Language[9][10] Place[11] Points
01  Ireland The Swarbriggs Plus Two "It's Nice to Be in Love Again" English 3 119
02  Monaco Michèle Torr "Une petite française" French 4 96
03  Netherlands Heddy Lester "De mallemolen" Dutch 12 35
04  Austria Schmetterlinge "Boom Boom Boomerang" German[lower-alpha 1] 17 11
05  Norway Anita Skorgan "Casanova" Norwegian 14 18
06  Germany Silver Convention "Telegram" English 8 55
07  Luxembourg Anne-Marie B "Frère Jacques" French 16 17
08  Portugal Os Amigos "Portugal no coração" Portuguese 14 18
09  United Kingdom Lynsey de Paul and Mike Moran "Rock Bottom" English 2 121
10  Greece Pascalis, Marianna, Robert and Bessy "Mathima solfege" (Μάθημα σολφέζ) Greek 5 92
11  Israel Ilanit "Ahava Hi Shir Lishnayim" (אהבה היא שיר לשניים) Hebrew 11 49
12   Switzerland Pepe Lienhard Band "Swiss Lady" German 6 71
13  Sweden Forbes "Beatles" Swedish 18 2
14  Spain Micky "Enséñame a cantar" Spanish 9 52
15  Italy Mia Martini "Libera" Italian 13 33
16  Finland Monica Aspelund "Lapponia" Finnish 10 50
17  Belgium Dream Express "A Million in One, Two, Three" English 7 69
18  France Marie Myriam "L'oiseau et l'enfant" French 1 136

Scoreboard
Voting results[12][13]
Total score
Ireland
Monaco
Netherlands
Austria
Norway
Germany
Luxembourg
Portugal
United Kingdom
Greece
Israel
Switzerland
Sweden
Spain
Italy
Finland
Belgium
France
Contestants
 Ireland 1198151258112101281248310
Monaco 965816167122610812525
Netherlands 353311171108
Austria 115231
Norway 18322155
Germany 551132288855561
Luxembourg 17278
Portugal 18221436
United Kingdom 121127127101212883241212
Greece 9210104446105317121663
Israel 4977535103612
Switzerland 7161010544644108
Sweden 22
Spain 526177343777
Italy 3386332227
Finland 501246827524
Belgium 694126847105643
France 1361048731210567101261010124

12 points

Below is a summary of all 12 points in the final:

N. Contestant Nation(s) giving 12 points
6  United Kingdom  Austria,  Belgium,  France,  Luxembourg,  Monaco,  Portugal
4  Ireland  Israel,  Norway,  Sweden,  United Kingdom
3  France  Finland,  Germany,   Switzerland
2  Monaco  Greece,  Italy
1  Belgium  Netherlands
 Finland  Ireland
 Greece  Spain

Spokespersons

Listed below is the order in which votes were cast during the 1977 contest along with the spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for their respective country.

  1.  Ireland – Brendan Balfe
  2.  Monaco – Carole Chabrier
  3.  Netherlands – Ralph Inbar
  4.  Austria – Jenny Pippal
  5.  Norway – Sverre Christophersen[14]
  6.  Germany – Armin Maiwald
  7.  Luxembourg – Jacques Harvey
  8.  Portugal – Ana Zanatti[15]
  9.  United Kingdom – Colin Berry[8]
  10.  Greece – Naki Agathou[16]
  11.  Israel – Yitzhak Shim'oni[17]
  12.   Switzerland – Michel Stocker[18]
  13.  Sweden – Sven Lindahl[19]
  14.  Spain – Isabel Tenaille[20]
  15.  Italy – Mariolina Cannuli
  16.  Finland – Kaarina Pönniö[21]
  17.  Belgium – An Ploegaerts
  18.  France – Marc Menant[22]

Broadcasts

Each national broadcaster also sent a commentator to the contest, in order to provide coverage of the contest in their own native language.

Broadcasters and commentators in participating countries
Country Broadcaster(s) Commentator(s) Ref(s)
 Austria FS1 Ernst Grissemann [23]
Hitradio Ö3 Hubert Gaisbauer
 Belgium BRT TV1 Dutch: Luc Appermont [24]
RTB1 French: Patrick Duhamel [25]
BRT Radio 1 Dutch: Nand Baert and Herwig Haes
RTB La Première French: André Zaleski
 Finland YLE TV1 Erkki Toivanen [26]
Yleisohjelma Matti Paalosmaa
 France TF1 Georges de Caunes [27]
France Inter Gérard Klein
 Germany Deutsches Fernsehen Werner Veigel [28]
Deutschlandfunk/Bayern 2 Wolf Mittler
 Greece EIRT Mako Georgiadou [29]
Proto Programma Dimitris Konstantaras
 Ireland RTÉ Mike Murphy
RTÉ Radio Liam Devally
 Israel Israeli Television No commentator
 Italy Rete 1 and Rai Radio 1 Silvio Noto
 Luxembourg RTL Télé Luxembourg Jacques Navadic
RTL André Torrent
 Monaco Télé Monte Carlo Georges de Caunes
 Netherlands Nederland 2 Ati Dijckmeester [30]
 Norway NRK John Andreassen [31]
NRK P1 Erik Heyerdahl
 Portugal I Programa Júlio Isidro
RDP Programa 1 Amadeu Meireles
 Spain Primera Cadena Miguel de los Santos [32]
 Sweden SR TV1 Ulf Elfving [19]
SR P3 Ursula Richter and Åke Strömmer [19]
  Switzerland TV DRS German: Theodor Haller [33]
TSR French: Georges Hardy [27]
TSI Italian: Giovanni Bertini
RSR 1 French: Robert Burnier [34]
 United Kingdom BBC1 Pete Murray [8][35]
BBC Radio 2 Terry Wogan [8]
Broadcasters and commentators in non-participating countries
Country Broadcaster(s) Commentator(s) Ref(s)
 Algeria ENTV Unknown [8]
 Bulgaria BT Unknown [8]
 Czechoslovakia ČST Unknown [8]
 Denmark DR TV Claus Toksvig [8]
 Greenland KNR [36]
 Hong Kong TVB Jade (delayed broadcast) Cantonese: Lee Chi-chung (李志中) [8]
TVB Pearl (delayed broadcast) English: George Lam (林子祥)
 Hungary RTV Unknown [8]
 Iceland Sjónvarpið No commentator [8][37]
 Jordan JRTV Unknown [8]
 Morocco TVM Unknown [8]
 Poland TVP Unknown [8]
 Romania TVR Unknown [8]
 Soviet Union ST SSSR II Programma (recorded telecast) Info themed programme presented by Alexander Kavyerznyev, only shown are performances of songs (excluding the performance of Israel, voting procedure and winning performance) [8]
 Tunisia RTT Unknown [8]
 Turkey Ankara Television Bülend Özveren [8]
 Yugoslavia TVB 2 Serbo-Croatian: Milovan Ilić [8]
TVZ 1 Serbo-Croatian: Oliver Mlakar
TVL 1 Slovene: Tomaž Terček

Incidents

Strike at BBC

As noted in The Eurovision Song Contest – The Official History by author and historian John Kennedy O'Connor, the contest was originally planned to be held on 2 April 1977, but because of a strike of the BBC cameramen and its technicians, it got postponed for a month. As a result, this is the first Eurovision Song Contest to be staged in May since the inaugural edition.[1]

Postcards

Due to strikes by the BBC camera staff, and lack of time to organise the contest, there were no postcards for the viewers in between the songs. However, various shots of the contests audience were shown, with the various countries' commentators informing the viewers of the upcoming songs. The intended postcards had been devised using footage of the artists in London during a party hosted by the BBC at a London nightclub. When the postcards were seen for the first time by the participant heads of delegation at the Friday dress rehearsal the day before the grand final, the delegation from NRK Norway objected to the way their young artist was portrayed. However, as it was not possible for the BBC to edit or revise footage, all the postcards had to be dropped from the broadcast. Footage from the party still formed the interval act broadcast prior to the voting sequence.[38]

See also

Notes
  1. Contains some words in English

References
  1. O'Connor, John Kennedy (2007). The Eurovision Song Contest: The Official History. UK: Carlton Books. p. 68. ISBN 978-1-84442-994-3.
  2. "Roman". The Museum of London. Archived from the original on 22 March 2008. Retrieved 7 June 2008.
  3. "London 1977". Eurovision.tv.
  4. O'Connor, John Kennedy (2007). The Eurovision Song Contest: The Official History. UK: Carlton Books. p. 71. ISBN 978-1-84442-994-3.
  5. Leigh, Spencer (4 October 2007). "Obituary – Ronnie Hazlehurst". The Daily Telegraph.
  6. "Obituary – Ronnie Hazlehurst". The Times. 3 October 2007.
  7. "And the conductor is..." Retrieved 10 July 2018.
  8. Roxburgh, Gordon (2014). Songs for Europe: The United Kingdom at the Eurovision Song Contest. Volume Two: The 1970s. Prestatyn: Telos Publishing. pp. 267–287. ISBN 978-1-84583-093-9.
  9. "Eurovision Song Contest 1977". The Diggiloo Thrush. Retrieved 4 March 2012.
  10. "Eurovision Song Contest 1977". 4Lyrics.eu. Retrieved 16 September 2020.
  11. "Final of London 1977". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 11 April 2021. Retrieved 11 April 2021.
  12. "Results of the Final of London 1977". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 11 April 2021. Retrieved 11 April 2021.
  13. "Eurovision Song Contest 1977 – Scoreboard". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 21 July 2021.
  14. Dyrseth, Seppo (OGAE Norway)
  15. "Comentadores Do ESC – escportugalforum.pt.vu | o forum eurovisivo português". 21595.activeboard.com. Archived from the original on 21 April 2012. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  16. "Εκφωνητές της ΕΡΤ για τις ψήφους της Ελλάδας στην EUROVISION – Page 3". Retromaniax.gr. Archived from the original on 11 September 2012. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  17. "פורום אירוויזיון". Sf.tapuz.co.il. 13 September 1999. Archived from the original on 8 October 2011. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  18. Baumann, Peter Ramón (OGAE Switzerland)
  19. "Infosajten.com". Infosajten.com. Archived from the original on 18 July 2012. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  20. Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine: "Eurovisión 1977 – Jurado TVE". YouTube. 7 May 1977. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  21. "Selostajat ja taustalaulajat läpi vuosien? • Viisukuppila". Viisukuppila.fi. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  22. de Caunes, Georges et al. (7 May 1977). 22ème Concours Eurovision de la Chanson 1977 [22nd Eurovision Song Contest 1977] (Television production). United Kingdom: BBC, TF1 (commentary).
  23. Archived October 24, 2007, at the Wayback Machine
  24. Adriaens, Manu & Loeckx-Van Cauwenberge, Joken. Blijven kiken!. Lannoo, Belgium. 2003 ISBN 90-209-5274-9
  25. "1977 - Wembley".
  26. "Selostajat ja taustalaulajat läpi vuosien? • Viisukuppila". Viisukuppila.fi. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  27. "Au Grand Prix Eurovision de la Chanson". Radio TV - Je vois tout. Lausanne, Switzerland: Le Radio SA. 5 May 1977.
  28. "Eurovision Song Contest 1977". Ecgermany.de. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  29. "Η Μακώ Γεωργιάδου και η EUROVISION (1970–1986)". Retromaniax.gr. Archived from the original on 30 May 2012. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  30. "Welkom op de site van Eurovision Artists". Eurovisionartists.nl. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  31. "Hvem kommenterte før Jostein Pedersen? - Debattforum". Nrk.no. Archived from the original on 2 November 2012. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  32. "FORO FESTIVAL DE EUROVISIÓN • Ver Tema – Uribarri comentarista Eurovision 2010". Eurosongcontest.phpbb3.es. Archived from the original on 17 March 2012. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  33. "Au Grand Prix Eurovision de la Chanson". Radio TV - Je vois tout. Lausanne, Switzerland: Le Radio SA. 5 May 1977.
  34. "Au Grand Prix Eurovision de la Chanson". Radio TV - Je vois tout. Lausanne, Switzerland: Le Radio SA. 5 May 1977.
  35. Eurovision Song Contest Grand Final: 1977. London, United Kingdom: British Broadcasting Corporation. 7 May 1977.
  36. Háskólabókasafn, Landsbókasafn Íslands -. "Timarit.is". timarit.is.
  37. Háskólabókasafn, Landsbókasafn Íslands -. "Timarit.is". timarit.is.
  38. O'Connor, John Kennedy. 'The Eurovision Song Contest - The Official Celebration'. Carlton Books 2015. ASIN: B0182Q85CS
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