Belgium in the Eurovision Song Contest 1961

Belgium was represented by Bob Benny, with the song "September, gouden roos", at the 1961 Eurovision Song Contest, which took place on 18 March in Cannes, France. The song was chosen in the national final on 29 February. Benny had previously represented Belgium in the 1959 contest. Future Belgian entrant Jacques Raymond (1963 and 1971) finished runner-up in the final.

Eurovision Song Contest 1961
Country Belgium
National selection
Selection processFinale van de Belgische Bijdrage tot het Songfestival
Selection date(s)29 February 1961
Selected entrantBob Benny
Selected song"September, gouden roos"
Selected songwriter(s)
  • Hans Flower
  • Wim Brabants
Finals performance
Final result15th, 1 point
Belgium in the Eurovision Song Contest
◄1960 • 1961 • 1962►

Before Eurovision

Finale van de Belgische Bijdrage tot het Songfestival

Finale van de Belgische Bijdrage tot het Songfestival was the national final format developed by BRT in order to select Belgium's entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 1961. The competition was held on 29 February 1961 at Amerikaans Theater in Brussels and hosted by Aimée De Smet and broadcast on BRT.[1]

Competing entries

BRT opened a submission period for artists and composers to submit their songs. 381 entries were submitted, from which, broadcaster selected 6 entries for the contest. Among the participants was Louis Neefs and Rina Pia, however, they had withdrew their songs from the contest due to the fact that they thought that their songs was "not that good to perform". Ultimately, they were replaced with Luc Van Hoeselt and Enny Denita.[2]

Final

National final was held on 29 February 1961 at 21:00 CET at Amerikaans Theater in Brussels and hosted by Aimée De Smet. Six songs took part with the winner being chosen by an "expert" jury. It is not known by what system the songs were scored.[3][4]

29 January 1961
Draw Artist Song Points Place
1 Tony Sandler "Moeder" 8 6
2 Jacques Raymond "Als je weent, als je lacht" 40 2
3 Jo Leemans "Af en toe" 33 3
4 Bob Benny "September, gouden roos" 60 1
5 Luc van Hoeselt "Bonjour" 21 4
6 Enny Denita "Maandenkrans der liefde" 14 5

At Eurovision

On the night of the final Bob Benny performed 11th in the running order, following Switzerland and preceding Norway.

At the close of the voting "September, gouden roos" had received only 1 point (from Luxembourg), placing Belgium joint last (with Austria) of the 16 competing entries. The Belgian jury split its 10 points between Norway (5), Italy (4) and the United Kingdom (1).[5]

Voting

Every country had a jury of ten people. Every jury member could give one point to his or her favourite song.

Trivia
  • According to Dutch newspaper Het vrije volk, conductor Francis Bay was not happy that Belgium didn't receive a single point from the Dutch juries, while the French-speaking countries were "forming a block" according to him. He proposed to set up a voting block with the Netherlands and the Scandinavian countries.[7]

References
  1. "Finale van de Belgische bijdrage tot het Songfestival 1961".
  2. "Finale van de Belgische bijdrage tot het Songfestival 1961".
  3. ESC National Finals database 1961
  4. "Finale van de Belgische bijdrage tot het Songfestival 1961".
  5. ESC History - Belgium 1961
  6. "Results of the Final of Cannes 1961". Eurovision Song Contest. Archived from the original on 28 March 2021. Retrieved 28 March 2021.
  7. "Gevonden in Delpher - Het vrije volk : Democratisch-socialistisch dagblad".
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