Eurovision Song Contest 1961

Eurovision Song Contest 1961
Eurovision Song Contest 1961
Dates
Final	18 March 1961
Host
Venue	Palais des Festivals et des Congrès; Cannes, France
Presenter(s)	Jacqueline Joubert
Musical director	Franck Pourcel
Directed by	Maurice Barry
Executive producer	Marcel Cravenne
Host broadcaster	Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française (RTF)
Interval act	Tessa Beaumont and Max Bozzoni
Website	eurovision.tv/event/cannes-1961
Participants
Number of entries	16
Debuting countries	Finland; Spain; Yugoslavia;
Returning countries	None
Non-returning countries	None
	Participation map Participating countries;
Vote
Voting system	Ten-member juries distributed 10 points among their favourite songs.
Nul points in final	None
Winning song	Luxembourg; "Nous les amoureux"

The Eurovision Song Contest 1961 was the 6th edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. Once again, the contest was held in the French seaside city of Cannes, having also hosted the 1959 edition. Organised by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and host broadcaster Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française (RTF), the contest was held again at the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès on 18 March 1961 and was the first to take place on a Saturday evening, a tradition that has continued ever since (with the exception of 1962). The show was again hosted by Jacqueline Joubert, who had also hosted in 1959.

Sixteen countries participated in the contest - three more than in the previous edition; Finland, Spain and Yugoslavia all competed for the first time this year.

The winner was Luxembourg with the song "Nous les amoureux", performed by Jean-Claude Pascal, written by Maurice Vidalin, and composed by Jacques Datin, with the United Kingdom finishing in second place for the third consecutive year.

Location

Palais des Festivals et des Congrès, Cannes - host venue of the 1961 contest.

The event took place in Cannes, France, with the venue being the original building of Palais des Festivals et des Congrès, after France got the right to host this edition of the Eurovision Song Contest for winning its previous 1960 with the song "Tom Pillibi" performed by Jacqueline Boyer.

Cannes, a city located on the French Riviera, is a busy tourist destination and known worldwide for hosting the annual Cannes Film Festival, with the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès also hosting the Film Festival. The original building was built in 1949 and was located on the boulevard of Promenade de la Croisette, on the present site of the JW Marriott Cannes. It also hosted the 1959 edition of the Eurovision Song Contest.

Format

The stage used for the 1961 contest was notably larger than in previous years and was magnificently decorated with flowers. It is noticeable that during the voting, Luxembourg gave the UK eight points, and Norway also gave Denmark eight points. It was the largest number of points given to a country by a single jury since 1958, when Denmark provided France with nine points. Such a high number of points obtained by a country would not be achieved until 1970, when Ireland would receive nine points from Belgium.[1]

Participating countries

Interest in the competition began to grow across Europe as three new countries participated for the first time: Finland, Spain, and Yugoslavia.[1]

Conductors

Each performance had a conductor who directed the orchestra.[2][3] Léo Chauliac, the conductor of the winning entry, was the first conductor whose sole Eurovision participation was for a winning entry.[lower-alpha 1]

Spain – Rafael Ferrer
Monaco – Raymond Lefèvre
Austria – Franck Pourcel
Finland – George de Godzinsky
Yugoslavia – Jože Privšek
Netherlands – Dolf van der Linden
Sweden – William Lind
Germany – Franck Pourcel
France – Franck Pourcel
Switzerland – Fernando Paggi
Belgium – Francis Bay
Norway – Øivind Bergh
Denmark – Kai Mortensen
Luxembourg – Léo Chauliac
United Kingdom – Harry Robinson
Italy – Gianfranco Intra

Returning artists

Artist	Country	Previous year(s)
Bob Benny	Belgium	1959
Nora Brockstedt	Norway	1960

Results

Draw	Country	Artist	Song	Language[4][5]	Place[6]	Points
01	Spain	Conchita Bautista	"Estando contigo"	Spanish	9	8
02	Monaco	Colette Deréal	"Allons, allons les enfants"	French	10	6
03	Austria	Jimmy Makulis	"Sehnsucht"	German	15	1
04	Finland	Laila Kinnunen	"Valoa ikkunassa"	Finnish	10	6
05	Yugoslavia	Ljiljana Petrović	"Neke davne zvezde" (Неке давне звезде)	Serbo-Croatian	8	9
06	Netherlands	Greetje Kauffeld	"Wat een dag"	Dutch	10	6
07	Sweden	Lill-Babs	"April, april"	Swedish	14	2
08	Germany	Lale Andersen	"Einmal sehen wir uns wieder"	German, French	13	3
09	France	Jean-Paul Mauric	"Printemps, avril carillonne"	French	4	13
10	Switzerland	Franca di Rienzo	"Nous aurons demain"	French	3	16
11	Belgium	Bob Benny	"September, gouden roos"	Dutch	15	1
12	Norway	Nora Brockstedt	"Sommer i Palma"	Norwegian	7	10
13	Denmark	Dario Campeotto	"Angelique"	Danish	5	12
14	Luxembourg	Jean-Claude Pascal	"Nous les amoureux"	French	1	31
15	United Kingdom	The Allisons	"Are You Sure?"	English	2	24
16	Italy	Betty Curtis	"Al di là"	Italian	5	12

Scoreboard

Each country had 10 jury members who each awarded 1 point to their favourite song.

Voting results[7][8]
		Total score	Italy	United Kingdom	Luxembourg	Denmark	Norway	Belgium	Switzerland	France	Germany	Sweden	Netherlands	Yugoslavia	Finland	Austria	Monaco	Spain
Contestants	Spain	8		1			2			2		1	1				1
	Monaco	6		1					1						3			1
	Austria	1		1
	Finland	6	2	2		1				1
	Yugoslavia	9		1		1			1	2			1			3
	Netherlands	6	2							1	1			2
	Sweden	2								2
	Germany	3				1						1				1
	France	13		2	1						4	1			1		2	2
	Switzerland	16	2	2								4	2	1		2	2	1
	Belgium	1			1
	Norway	10				1		5						1	2			1
	Denmark	12					8					2	1		1
	Luxembourg	31	3			1			1	1	5	1	1	5	3	4	4	2
	United Kingdom	24	1		8	1		1	7				3					3
	Italy	12				4		4		1			1	1			1

Spokespersons

Listed below is the order in which votes were cast during the 1961 contest along with the spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for their respective country.[9]

Italy – Enzo Tortora
United Kingdom – Michael Aspel[3]
Luxembourg – TBC
Denmark – Ole Mortensen
Norway – Mette Janson[10]
Belgium – Ward Bogaert
Switzerland – Boris Acquadro
France – Armand Lanoux
Germany – Heinz Schenk
Sweden – Roland Eiworth[11]
Netherlands – Siebe van der Zee[12]
Yugoslavia – Saša Novak
Finland – Poppe Berg
Austria – Emil Kollpacher
Monaco – TBC
Spain – Diego Ramírez Pastor

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	ORF	Wolf Mittler
Belgium	RTB	French: Robert Beauvais	[13]
Belgium	BRT	Dutch: Nic Bal
Denmark	Danmarks Radio TV	Sejr Volmer-Sørensen
Finland	Suomen Televisio, Yleisradio	Aarno Walli
France	RTF	Robert Beauvais	[13]
Germany	Deutsches Fernsehen	Wolf Mittler
Italy	Programma Nazionale	Corrado Mantoni
Luxembourg	Télé-Luxembourg	Robert Beauvais	[13]
Monaco	Télé Monte Carlo	Robert Beauvais	[13]
Netherlands	NTS, Hilversum 1	Piet te Nuyl	[12][14]
Norway	NRK, NRK P1	Leif Rustad
Spain	TVE	Federico Gallo
Sweden	Sveriges TV, SR P1	Jan Gabrielsson	[15]
Switzerland	TV DRS	German: Theodor Haller
Switzerland	TSR	French: Robert Beauvais	[13]
United Kingdom	BBC TV	Tom Sloan	[3]
United Kingdom	BBC Light Programme	Pete Murray
Yugoslavia	Televizija Beograd	Serbo-Croatian: Ljubomir Vukadinović
	Televizija Zagreb	Serbo-Croatian: Saša Novak
	Televizija Ljubljana	Slovene: Tomaž Terček

Incidents

BBC broadcast cut

As the contest overran its allocated time, and the show was being broadcast live, the winning song's reprise was not shown in the United Kingdom.[1]

References

"Eurovision Song Contest 1961". EBU. Retrieved 13 February 2009.
"And the conductor is..." Retrieved 10 July 2018.
Roxburgh, Gordon (2012). Songs for Europe: The United Kingdom at the Eurovision Song Contest. Volume One: The 1950s and 1960s. Prestatyn: Telos Publishing. pp. 254–264. ISBN 978-1-84583-065-6.
"Eurovision Song Contest 1961". The Diggiloo Thrush. Retrieved 4 March 2012.
"Eurovision Song Contest 1961". 4Lyrics.eu. Retrieved 16 September 2020.
"Final of Cannes 1961". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 28 March 2021. Retrieved 28 March 2021.
"Results of the Final of Cannes 1961". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 28 March 2021. Retrieved 28 March 2021.
"Eurovision Song Contest 1961 – Scoreboard". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 10 June 2015. Retrieved 14 June 2021.
"Eurovision 1961 - Cast and Crew". IMDb. Retrieved 17 July 2020.
Dyrseth, Seppo (OGAE Norway)
"Infosajten.com". Archived from the original on 18 July 2012. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
"Greetje vanavond nummer zes". Nieuwe Leidsche Courant. 18 March 1961. p. 7. Retrieved 11 June 2021.
Christian Masson. "1961 - Cannes". Songcontest.free.fr. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
"Nederlandse televisiecommentatoren bij het Eurovisie Songfestival". Eurovision Artists (in Dutch).
Thorsson, Leif (2006). Melodifestivalen genom tiderna [Melodifestivalen through time]. Stockholm: Premium Publishing AB. p. 34. ISBN 91-89136-29-2.

Notes

He would be succeeded in that regard by 1966's Hans Hammerschmid, 1967's Kenny Woodman, 1969's Frans de Kok and Johnny Harris, 1972's Klaus Munro, 1974's Sven-Olof Walldoff, 1990's Gianni Madonini, and 1997's Don Airey.

External links

Official website

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.

[official1961-1] "Eurovision Song Contest 1961". EBU. Retrieved 13 February 2009.

[2] "And the conductor is..." Retrieved 10 July 2018.

[Roxburgh-3] Roxburgh, Gordon (2012). Songs for Europe: The United Kingdom at the Eurovision Song Contest. Volume One: The 1950s and 1960s. Prestatyn: Telos Publishing. pp. 254–264. ISBN 978-1-84583-065-6.

[5] "Eurovision Song Contest 1961". The Diggiloo Thrush. Retrieved 4 March 2012.

[6] "Eurovision Song Contest 1961". 4Lyrics.eu. Retrieved 16 September 2020.

[7] "Final of Cannes 1961". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 28 March 2021. Retrieved 28 March 2021.

[8] "Results of the Final of Cannes 1961". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 28 March 2021. Retrieved 28 March 2021.

[9] "Eurovision Song Contest 1961 – Scoreboard". European Broadcasting Union. Archived from the original on 10 June 2015. Retrieved 14 June 2021.

[spokespersons-10] "Eurovision 1961 - Cast and Crew". IMDb. Retrieved 17 July 2020.

[Norwegian-11] Dyrseth, Seppo (OGAE Norway)

[Swedish-12] "Infosajten.com". Archived from the original on 18 July 2012. Retrieved 10 August 2012.

[Dutch-13] "Greetje vanavond nummer zes". Nieuwe Leidsche Courant. 18 March 1961. p. 7. Retrieved 11 June 2021.

[Christian_Masson-14] Christian Masson. "1961 - Cannes". Songcontest.free.fr. Retrieved 10 August 2012.

[15] "Nederlandse televisiecommentatoren bij het Eurovisie Songfestival". Eurovision Artists (in Dutch).

[16] Thorsson, Leif (2006). Melodifestivalen genom tiderna [Melodifestivalen through time]. Stockholm: Premium Publishing AB. p. 34. ISBN 91-89136-29-2.

[4] He would be succeeded in that regard by 1966's Hans Hammerschmid, 1967's Kenny Woodman, 1969's Frans de Kok and Johnny Harris, 1972's Klaus Munro, 1974's Sven-Olof Walldoff, 1990's Gianni Madonini, and 1997's Don Airey.