A few other things I couldn’t fit in the description: - Another big thank you to those who’ve supported me on ko-fi/thereorderboard! There’s been some generous tips and some lovely emails that I’m trying to reply to! - *ENTRY REMOVED*: Yes, late uploading because CZcams didn’t allow me to have vision or sound of the Italian entry, on account of RAI owning the copyright. Odd, since I got the original from here! I do think this channel has now had it’s copyrighted material escalated or something, but perhaps not. Certainly this is the most aggressively squashed entry since Bosnia’s 1999 performance. The delay in uploading was first be removing the audio and trying, and then having to remove vision too. - So, although we don’t see any overlayed graphics between songs this year, we do see a winning ‘flag’ as in, a marker on the scoreboard for the first time. Something that many other boards to come could have benefitted from. This was simply an arrow on a pulley system. A big stick to guide people around the board was also employed, furthering the matron-esque image of the presenter. - Although I’m not a fan of the winner, which seems to play heavily on Dutch’s cute turn of adding ‘je’ to the end of words, we shouldn’t overlook the fact that Willy Van Hermert had also written Brokken’s winning song in 1957, making him the first writer to win twice - a record he will keep alone until 1972. - Another first was duets! Germany took the lead, closely followed by the UK’s Carr & Johnson. I can’t say I much care for the German entry at all, although the girls did take the contest in a new direction: the first few dance steps on a Eurovision stage! That’s if you don’t count Birthe Wilke’s prancing. - I quite enjoyed the French commentary, particularly whistling at one point during the voting - I also felt that ‘that’s all’ had become a Eurovision saying since he mentioned it at one point. Certainly, during the first round of voting, the commentator was trying to keep the audience abreast of how many points were left for each jury. - Monaco had enjoyed a greater spotlight because of the principality’s Rainier III marrying American actress Grace Kelly in 1956. With a population of 100,000 in 1959 their inclusion leaves the number of Francophone countries involved in Eurovision in general at 5 (including Luxembourg who didn’t make an appearance here). Obviously, Switzerland’s choices boost numbers: German = 3, Italian = 2, Scandi = 2, Dutch = 2, English = 1; - Around about this time, I’ve mentioned the turmoil in France last time, which was hoped to be quelled by the inauguration of De Gaulle as President. European projects were to be one of De Gaulle’s aims, declaring that France’s chance to be ‘number 1 in the world, for the first time since Napoleon’ laid in the EEC, as the German’s and Italians were still considered disgraced by the Second World War and the British looking like they were going to tag on to the Americans. Chris West summarises this approach well in his book. - Although Switzerland had plenty of choices of language, it didn’t feel that women should have the right to choose their political leaders…voters turned down the chance for female suffrage in a referendum around the time of the Contest, by a margin of 66% to 33%. Swiss women would get the vote, Canton by Canton, throughout the 60s, 70s,80s and lastly, 1990. - More helpful to the cause of humanity was the establishment of the European Court of Human Rights in January, and the decision in London to grant Cyprus her independence was also taken a few months before this Contest. It would be a while before Cyprus would enter the Song Contest, as the independence of the island unfortunately only appeared to augment a violent period throughout the 1960s and 1970s. - Sticking to islands, in the western Hemisphere, Fidel Castro became leader of Cuba - an event that would come to affect all European lives in due course. In America, the first Barbie doll went on sale too, and I can’t promise that the maker of this video has never played with one.
Duets weren't first seen here, remember the kissing Danish couple in 1957? What was a first though (I believe) were twins performing together, namely the two from Germany!
Really great to see. Thank you for your hard work to bring this early Eurovision and second Dutch win to us. I liked the top three with the UK being for me the top spot.
Oh well I don't know what to say to that...congratulations? I'm up for the home working revolution...otherwise not sure how I'm going to keep the channel going lol
They all seemed ready to go for the performances though didn't they! The presenter really does read out the top three quite slowly. 'Being under' (the tv technical term) is quite remarkable though, as the opening is longer than 1957 & 1958. Obviously the Dutch padded out with two interval acts, so really RTF should have gone with at least one....but then I expect Frank Pourcel had trouble getting the orchestra to perform the songs correctly, let alone bash out another performance! The Dutch also had 11 songs too, if you count the technical issue so it must be the interval act that was missing...and maybe some stairs for the acts to slowly descend!
@@thereorderboard it may not be true that the show ran under, I’m sure the truth is long lost in time. It’s something we’ll never see again, though in 1971 there was a presentation to the top 3 performers.
The 1959 scoreboard became the template scoreboard for the early years of Eurovision. While there’s an additional column added in 1961 on the rightmost side of the board (repeating song number which was already on the leftmost side of the board), it will be 1963 before there’s a shake-up of scoreboard design. I also can’t figure out how the numbers worked, but from 1961, this became a very common way to display scores, though split-flap numbers appear in the late 1960s, and in 1971, we get electronics for the first time. I must say, French TV was very ambitious in having three digits for total score. The maximum points available in 1959 was 100, and that would only have been achieved had every country given all of their 10 votes to one country (which couldn’t vote for itself), which was very, very unlikely to occur. In fact, the winner only scored 21 points!
Well I guess it's better to be ambitious than not preparing for a tie for example. (1969, right?) To this day I can't understand how the EBU never thought about creating tie break rules, especially considering the small number of participating (and voting) countries.
@@klaudiaszilagyi669 somehow they were convinced it would never happen! There’s the often-quoted story told by 1969 presenter Laurita Valenzuela that when she asked Clifford Brown, the then-EBU scrutineer, what she would do in the event of a tie, she was told that it could never and would never happen!
@@mrjdsworld80 Yes, I've heard about this story but I still find it unbelievable how they thought it could never happen. I mean, Spain literally won by only 1 point in 1968. I guess that should've reminded them to create some kind of tie-break rule but what's passed is passed.
First class work again. I particularly loved the revolving curlicues at the top of the scoreboard, and the choice of font for the names of the countries. Just brilliant all round. 👍
I love how you added the twirling chandelier effect to the 1959 scoreboard--it was a definite highlight of the stage and I liked it quite a lot! As for the contest, I preferred the production of it to the songs. Jacqueline Joubert seems like an underrated host, in that she had a curious persona and her way of doing things. Again, the songs blurred together, though they are a bit more upbeat than the years before it. My top three: 3. DEN -- One half of my 1957 winner comes back with a song that wouldn't get lost on a Disney soundtrack. The "oohs!" might be annoying to some, but it definitely adds charm to this cheerful song, looking for love. 2. GBR -- I'm torn between this one and my winner this year. This is bouncy and sweet, and even reflects some bit of nostalgia when the couple grows up. I love the little bird chirps and how enthusiastically they sing this song! It comes off as a bit repetitive, however... 1. GER -- This, on the other hand, is a bit more sensual. I like the jazzy sound of this one and how they tried to flirt with their love interest. A bit more sedate in some ways than "Sing, Little Birdie", but still quite endearing to see.
Interesting choices! I did leave a longer edit of GBR and I agree it's repetitive...it's almost like it could have been Patricia Bredin type length but instead they decided to fill out the time instead of repeating the mistake of 1957!
Well I am going to attempt to put 1960 out before...if I get a fair wind this weekend. That'll allow me Eurovision weekend off without delaying the project too much!
Well! After being absolutely gobsmacked by the sheer stunningness (yes, a word) of your reorderboard Series 1, I’m making my way through your equally stunning series 2 and truly blown away by the detail each of your scoreboards have especially in these early years of Eurovision - honestly it’s incredible! That and the well documented background of the event and the rationale behind your design (noting your very useful explanation of Viz back on our comments exchange of Eurovision 1993, marrying it with your notable interpretation of the specific years design): making each one it’s own very well produced package of the year itself. From a working-in-telly point of view this is particularly great to see. Learning a lot more about the history of the contests a lot quicker and more indepth than I ever have done! The subtitles are a very nice touch too. Had many thoughts and comments starting with your first, 1957, but my excitement has led me here - so standby for a deluge of comments and praises for your other instalments! 1959 is quite a unique year with this stunning intro presentation of each of the countries on this spinning vending machine, actually quite innovative. And the three performance points - something we wouldn’t see again until 1996, IIRC. What’s interesting is the experimental ways of deciding how to produce each year, this with the first and only time featuring the top three performing again for example. And, how the entries representing a completely different sound to popular music of the time in the UK’s case as mentioned, something that doesn’t sound too dissimilar to the cognitive dissonance we seem to be having now, many decades later! And my isn’t that host scary - I would not want to mix my quatres and cinqs with her wielding that stick! Superb job as always :)
The presenter is quite the schoolmarm both with her stick and her slightly harsh demeanour with some of the spokerspersons. Like most early contests, I have never listened to the songs here. But based on the snippets I agree with you that Switzerland was the best. I would probably have put Germany second and Netherlands third. But your presentation is, once again, amazing.
I started smiling even before watching the video, this project gives me so much joy. So thank you so much. Excellent work as always, the spinning baroque chandelier was truly amazing and reminded perfectly of the stage - in 100 years people will still recognize at glance the 1959 stage, such a pity that's not the case anymore as the stages tend to look very similar to each other nowadays. Wondering what kind of rights RAI owns (that's pretty bizarre), anyways the Kessler Twins after this appearance became huge stars of the Italian television, participating to many RAI shows in the early 60's, and still nowadays are considered true legends (the song Dadaumpa, from the 1961 show "Studio uno" is still well known in Italy nowadays czcams.com/video/HbWIVJqrjfo/video.html).
That's really interesting about the Kessler Twins...I felt they were pretty annoying at this Contest lol! Thanks for your kind words! I assume RAI own the copyright to that performance, and perhaps being a public broadcaster they're not in a position to earn money on it through CZcams...I'm not sure. Or there could be a dispute with another record company. Usually it's just the audio though!
@@thereorderboard The copyright of each show prior to 2003 is owned by the host country, although many countries don't realise this and think the EBU own everything. There are also different performance rights [performance rights being different to copyrights] that are shared for each of the countries performances. Also the winning country gets special privileges to performance rights of the show they won. It's probably Domineco's personal shared copyright owned by his descendants that are blocking the video. He is still a legend in Italy and lots of money is made off his songs and image.
It was strongly rumoured, and discussed openly apparently afterwards by some of the delegations, that this contest saw the first evidence of tactical voting. Not voting tactically to hope their country might win, but to prevent others from winning. Italy didn't want France, who were hot favourites, to win, although one jury member rebelled, and not many people in the music business wanted Italy to win as Domenico wasn't liked by any of the musicians in Europe due to his diva behaviour after the success of Volare, as it came to be known. Many of the TV company executives were actively campaigning against him. The Top 3 performing again was rehearsed and always planned. Each country rehearsed a short reprise sequence with the orchestra. It was brought in to help promote the non-winning entries and maybe assist in sales. However the actual artists didn't like the idea and it was not done again. When the Top 3 presentations were done in 1971, the artists who came second and third said they felt humiliated and that's why it was again never repeated.
Some Euro Geek stuff about 1959. Brita Borg didn't sing in the Swedish National Final. Although it was known she would go to Eurovision, all the songs were sung by other artists. Augustin was sung by Sir Malmkvist. Jacques Pills was the father of Jacqueline Boyer who would win the following year. Jacques was at one time married to Edith Piaf and therefore Edith was technically Jacqueline's step-mother for 2 years. The venue Palais De Festivals is one of the Eurovision venues that no longer exists. It was demolished in the early 1980's and a new venue, with the same name, erected elsewhere. Many Eurovision sites, including the EBU, show pictures of the new building by mistake. Ferry Graf moved to Finland in the 1970's, became a Finnish citizen and formed a Hillbilly music band which did Finnish and German versions of Elvis songs. Jean Phillipe appeared in the UK crime/musical Jazz Boat as the owner of a nightclub in London and sang Qui Qui Qui Qui Qui. A backing vocal is partly sung in English in the film but no English version was ever recorded. Teddy Scholten is one of 10 Eurovision winners who have died. Jacqueline Joubert is one of 13 presenters who have gone. As well as Jacquline, we have lost a number of singers from 1959. They are: Domineco Modugno - Italy, Jacques Pills - Monaco, Teddy Scholten - Netherlands, Brita Borg - Sweden, Bob Benny - Belgium, Christa Williams - Switzerland, Ferry Fraf - Austria, Teddy Johnson UK & Pearl Carr UK.
I’m guessing the 13 presenters no longer with us are: Lohengrin, Hannie, Jacqueline, Katie, Renata, Erica, Moira, Corry, Leon, Daniel, Helga (from 1990, not 1973), Gerry and Terry?
Jacqueline was terrifying! Her whole vibe just screams “schoolmistress” whether it’s the very conservative dress, the pointing stick and the scolding of the spokespersons. Not to mention the very rude calling up of each country: “À VOUS, LA SUISSE!” Of course we’ll see her again as part of your project, and rather soon... From what I can tell, in the mid-1960s, she was more likely to be directing programmes instead of fronting them, and since she mainly worked in children’s television, probably best as she would have terrified the poor children. Interestingly, her predecessor as Eurovision presenter also mainly worked in children’s television. Fun fact: she’s the mum of Antoine de Caunes (of Eurotrash fame!)
The Antoine de Caunes fact is amazing!! Yes she seems very qualified at doing a lot in television, and actually I would say she's ideal as a Eurovision host...even at this early stage it's quite a complex job!
@@thereorderboard yes, I believe she was the “Grande Dame” of RTF, and was obviously highly-regarded, as she’d do the job again! Though unlike Katie and Petra, she is rather forgotten as someone who presented the contest more than once.
I meant to say this before but forgot, I wonder if the scores had been relayed to Cannes before the voting opened, or at least during the voting but before each country voted? The 'automatic' scoreboard worked so seamlessly that it was almost like magic. I know that the following year in London [and possibly again in Cannes in '61] the scores were noted from the jury spokesperson to the person who was their initial contact [think of the woman sitting at the desk beside Anaid Iplicjian the Presenter in 1957 and the person Hannie Lips in 1958 was asking on the telephone to contact her with the juries] before being transmitted live. I presume this was in case there was a break in the midst of one countries scores when they'd only given half of them.
Yes I can only assume that there was a safety mechanism in place, considering how ropey some of the lines were in the 1980s, let alone the 50s! The 59 board did seem remarkably accurate, but then that display unit is used multiple times (I think as late at 1967), so maybe it was just very good! At one point in 1960, Boyle mentions not being able to hear 'the playback', which I thought was an interesting choice of phrase. Noting her uniform method of calling up the juries, I wondered if a tape recording was being played, but then there's an error with Austria and the spokesperson says something that suggests his audio is live. 'Play back' could just be her term for 'relay' though! Plenty more when I put that video up next week.
@@thereorderboard Yes it is weird it works so quickly in 1959 given the fact someone has to count up and add the score and then get it on the board. The numbers are small but even so it goes suspiciously smoothly. I wonder if Katie in 1960 is wearing an earpiece? Would they be worn back then? When she says at the start of the voting, 'I can hear nothing', I know she is speaking to the control box not the audience. It's as though she hasn't been switched on. I have a photograph of me standing in the spot she's on doing her 'I can hear nothing' pose. The scoreboard in 1967 was still being worked manually by students on ladders so someone somewhere was quickly counting on their fingers. Excellent work again by the way.
@@thereorderboard I think 1973 was the last time scores were shown on a scoreboard like that. The switch to split-flap numbers by the BBC for ‘68 was a step back, because it was back to having to flip through the numbers until the correct ones was reached.
@@riva1958 and those students did a terrible job, as we’ll see when 1967 is covered. Oddly, the scoreboard works fine in Vienna for the most part, with about five juries left it all goes haywire. I can only imagine Erica thinking she was almost home and dry with a few juries left…not to be.
@@mrjdsworld80 1968 was an electronic scoreboard and was bang on trend. There are many retro clocks that work the same way for sale. I have one myself. The numbers still flick over, that was just the trendy style of the thing, but it is worked electronically not by hand.The operator only had to enter the total amount, not press the button for each individual vote.
I can tell that the our entry "Augustin" had a more speedy arrangement from the beginning with Siw Malmkvist who won our national final (the first Melodifestivalen ever) but for some odd reason she was not sent, neither did we send any conductor, probably why the song got slower arrangment in Cannes, had we gone with the more uptemp arrangement and Siw Malmkvist, we would have done better I think
Sweden gave their votes in French quite a bit in the early days when the contest was held in a Francophone country. As you’ll see when we get to 1966, the presenter can’t hide her joy that they do.
@@mrjdsworld80 And the Netherlands too! Though the fact that the Netherlands also gave scores in French in 1979 in Jerusalem came as a bit of a surprise to me...
A few other things I couldn’t fit in the description:
- Another big thank you to those who’ve supported me on ko-fi/thereorderboard! There’s been some generous tips and some lovely emails that I’m trying to reply to!
- *ENTRY REMOVED*: Yes, late uploading because CZcams didn’t allow me to have vision or sound of the Italian entry, on account of RAI owning the copyright. Odd, since I got the original from here! I do think this channel has now had it’s copyrighted material escalated or something, but perhaps not. Certainly this is the most aggressively squashed entry since Bosnia’s 1999 performance. The delay in uploading was first be removing the audio and trying, and then having to remove vision too.
- So, although we don’t see any overlayed graphics between songs this year, we do see a winning ‘flag’ as in, a marker on the scoreboard for the first time. Something that many other boards to come could have benefitted from. This was simply an arrow on a pulley system. A big stick to guide people around the board was also employed, furthering the matron-esque image of the presenter.
- Although I’m not a fan of the winner, which seems to play heavily on Dutch’s cute turn of adding ‘je’ to the end of words, we shouldn’t overlook the fact that Willy Van Hermert had also written Brokken’s winning song in 1957, making him the first writer to win twice - a record he will keep alone until 1972.
- Another first was duets! Germany took the lead, closely followed by the UK’s Carr & Johnson. I can’t say I much care for the German entry at all, although the girls did take the contest in a new direction: the first few dance steps on a Eurovision stage! That’s if you don’t count Birthe Wilke’s prancing.
- I quite enjoyed the French commentary, particularly whistling at one point during the voting - I also felt that ‘that’s all’ had become a Eurovision saying since he mentioned it at one point. Certainly, during the first round of voting, the commentator was trying to keep the audience abreast of how many points were left for each jury.
- Monaco had enjoyed a greater spotlight because of the principality’s Rainier III marrying American actress Grace Kelly in 1956. With a population of 100,000 in 1959 their inclusion leaves the number of Francophone countries involved in Eurovision in general at 5 (including Luxembourg who didn’t make an appearance here). Obviously, Switzerland’s choices boost numbers: German = 3, Italian = 2, Scandi = 2, Dutch = 2, English = 1;
- Around about this time, I’ve mentioned the turmoil in France last time, which was hoped to be quelled by the inauguration of De Gaulle as President. European projects were to be one of De Gaulle’s aims, declaring that France’s chance to be ‘number 1 in the world, for the first time since Napoleon’ laid in the EEC, as the German’s and Italians were still considered disgraced by the Second World War and the British looking like they were going to tag on to the Americans. Chris West summarises this approach well in his book.
- Although Switzerland had plenty of choices of language, it didn’t feel that women should have the right to choose their political leaders…voters turned down the chance for female suffrage in a referendum around the time of the Contest, by a margin of 66% to 33%. Swiss women would get the vote, Canton by Canton, throughout the 60s, 70s,80s and lastly, 1990.
- More helpful to the cause of humanity was the establishment of the European Court of Human Rights in January, and the decision in London to grant Cyprus her independence was also taken a few months before this Contest. It would be a while before Cyprus would enter the Song Contest, as the independence of the island unfortunately only appeared to augment a violent period throughout the 1960s and 1970s.
- Sticking to islands, in the western Hemisphere, Fidel Castro became leader of Cuba - an event that would come to affect all European lives in due course. In America, the first Barbie doll went on sale too, and I can’t promise that the maker of this video has never played with one.
Women only got the vote in certain Swiss cantons in 1990?? That’s shockingly late - heavens above!
"and I can’t promise that the maker of this video has never played with one." XD
Duets weren't first seen here, remember the kissing Danish couple in 1957? What was a first though (I believe) were twins performing together, namely the two from Germany!
32:20 - “First second place”.
Don’t worry - there are plenty more where that came from.
HAHA
Really great to see. Thank you for your hard work to bring this early Eurovision and second Dutch win to us. I liked the top three with the UK being for me the top spot.
Thanks Peter!
Awesome! Today was my first day back in the office after 14 months. Can’t wait to watch this on the journey home!
Oh well I don't know what to say to that...congratulations? I'm up for the home working revolution...otherwise not sure how I'm going to keep the channel going lol
@@thereorderboard haha I’m easing back in, just one day per week for now. I need to start wearing trousers again that don’t have an elasticated waist.
@@mrjdsworld80 I am literally wearing the same right now lol
Thank you for the great job, I appreciate it. Also French commentator is a big plus.
Apparently the top 3 all performed again because the show ran short...seems amazing that could ever happen nowadays!
They all seemed ready to go for the performances though didn't they! The presenter really does read out the top three quite slowly. 'Being under' (the tv technical term) is quite remarkable though, as the opening is longer than 1957 & 1958. Obviously the Dutch padded out with two interval acts, so really RTF should have gone with at least one....but then I expect Frank Pourcel had trouble getting the orchestra to perform the songs correctly, let alone bash out another performance! The Dutch also had 11 songs too, if you count the technical issue so it must be the interval act that was missing...and maybe some stairs for the acts to slowly descend!
@@thereorderboard it may not be true that the show ran under, I’m sure the truth is long lost in time. It’s something we’ll never see again, though in 1971 there was a presentation to the top 3 performers.
@Miro Heinonen Yes, I did state that in my answer!
This is so brilliant (again). Nice design, and great job. Eurovision memories are so unique and you give them a special taste. Congratulations.
The 1959 scoreboard became the template scoreboard for the early years of Eurovision. While there’s an additional column added in 1961 on the rightmost side of the board (repeating song number which was already on the leftmost side of the board), it will be 1963 before there’s a shake-up of scoreboard design.
I also can’t figure out how the numbers worked, but from 1961, this became a very common way to display scores, though split-flap numbers appear in the late 1960s, and in 1971, we get electronics for the first time. I must say, French TV was very ambitious in having three digits for total score. The maximum points available in 1959 was 100, and that would only have been achieved had every country given all of their 10 votes to one country (which couldn’t vote for itself), which was very, very unlikely to occur. In fact, the winner only scored 21 points!
Well I guess it's better to be ambitious than not preparing for a tie for example. (1969, right?) To this day I can't understand how the EBU never thought about creating tie break rules, especially considering the small number of participating (and voting) countries.
@@klaudiaszilagyi669 somehow they were convinced it would never happen! There’s the often-quoted story told by 1969 presenter Laurita Valenzuela that when she asked Clifford Brown, the then-EBU scrutineer, what she would do in the event of a tie, she was told that it could never and would never happen!
@@mrjdsworld80 Yes, I've heard about this story but I still find it unbelievable how they thought it could never happen. I mean, Spain literally won by only 1 point in 1968. I guess that should've reminded them to create some kind of tie-break rule but what's passed is passed.
First class work again. I particularly loved the revolving curlicues at the top of the scoreboard, and the choice of font for the names of the countries. Just brilliant all round. 👍
I love how you added the twirling chandelier effect to the 1959 scoreboard--it was a definite highlight of the stage and I liked it quite a lot!
As for the contest, I preferred the production of it to the songs. Jacqueline Joubert seems like an underrated host, in that she had a curious persona and her way of doing things. Again, the songs blurred together, though they are a bit more upbeat than the years before it.
My top three:
3. DEN -- One half of my 1957 winner comes back with a song that wouldn't get lost on a Disney soundtrack. The "oohs!" might be annoying to some, but it definitely adds charm to this cheerful song, looking for love.
2. GBR -- I'm torn between this one and my winner this year. This is bouncy and sweet, and even reflects some bit of nostalgia when the couple grows up. I love the little bird chirps and how enthusiastically they sing this song! It comes off as a bit repetitive, however...
1. GER -- This, on the other hand, is a bit more sensual. I like the jazzy sound of this one and how they tried to flirt with their love interest. A bit more sedate in some ways than "Sing, Little Birdie", but still quite endearing to see.
Interesting choices! I did leave a longer edit of GBR and I agree it's repetitive...it's almost like it could have been Patricia Bredin type length but instead they decided to fill out the time instead of repeating the mistake of 1957!
It’s very exciting to realise that we’ll have had Eurovision by the time you post your next review!
Oh wow - and I’d have just completed all my assessments for A-Level (leaving me for a nice long holiday until Uni starts in September...)
Well I am going to attempt to put 1960 out before...if I get a fair wind this weekend. That'll allow me Eurovision weekend off without delaying the project too much!
@@thereorderboard oh fantastic!
Well! After being absolutely gobsmacked by the sheer stunningness (yes, a word) of your reorderboard Series 1, I’m making my way through your equally stunning series 2 and truly blown away by the detail each of your scoreboards have especially in these early years of Eurovision - honestly it’s incredible! That and the well documented background of the event and the rationale behind your design (noting your very useful explanation of Viz back on our comments exchange of Eurovision 1993, marrying it with your notable interpretation of the specific years design): making each one it’s own very well produced package of the year itself. From a working-in-telly point of view this is particularly great to see.
Learning a lot more about the history of the contests a lot quicker and more indepth than I ever have done!
The subtitles are a very nice touch too.
Had many thoughts and comments starting with your first, 1957, but my excitement has led me here - so standby for a deluge of comments and praises for your other instalments!
1959 is quite a unique year with this stunning intro presentation of each of the countries on this spinning vending machine, actually quite innovative. And the three performance points - something we wouldn’t see again until 1996, IIRC.
What’s interesting is the experimental ways of deciding how to produce each year, this with the first and only time featuring the top three performing again for example. And, how the entries representing a completely different sound to popular music of the time in the UK’s case as mentioned, something that doesn’t sound too dissimilar to the cognitive dissonance we seem to be having now, many decades later!
And my isn’t that host scary - I would not want to mix my quatres and cinqs with her wielding that stick!
Superb job as always :)
Thanks for leaving such a great comment again! I'm glad you're enjoying them! I think we're both learning a lot of history from these!
27:31 - I believe that noise was heard across Europe when Ukraine's public vote points were revealed on Saturday.
I loved the 1959 voting so much! Thank you :)
Gosh - she really scolded the Danish spokesperson!
I think she was getting stressed lol😂
The presenter is quite the schoolmarm both with her stick and her slightly harsh demeanour with some of the spokerspersons. Like most early contests, I have never listened to the songs here. But based on the snippets I agree with you that Switzerland was the best. I would probably have put Germany second and Netherlands third. But your presentation is, once again, amazing.
I started smiling even before watching the video, this project gives me so much joy. So thank you so much.
Excellent work as always, the spinning baroque chandelier was truly amazing and reminded perfectly of the stage - in 100 years people will still recognize at glance the 1959 stage, such a pity that's not the case anymore as the stages tend to look very similar to each other nowadays.
Wondering what kind of rights RAI owns (that's pretty bizarre), anyways the Kessler Twins after this appearance became huge stars of the Italian television, participating to many RAI shows in the early 60's, and still nowadays are considered true legends (the song Dadaumpa, from the 1961 show "Studio uno" is still well known in Italy nowadays czcams.com/video/HbWIVJqrjfo/video.html).
That's really interesting about the Kessler Twins...I felt they were pretty annoying at this Contest lol! Thanks for your kind words! I assume RAI own the copyright to that performance, and perhaps being a public broadcaster they're not in a position to earn money on it through CZcams...I'm not sure. Or there could be a dispute with another record company. Usually it's just the audio though!
@@thereorderboard The copyright of each show prior to 2003 is owned by the host country, although many countries don't realise this and think the EBU own everything. There are also different performance rights [performance rights being different to copyrights] that are shared for each of the countries performances. Also the winning country gets special privileges to performance rights of the show they won. It's probably Domineco's personal shared copyright owned by his descendants that are blocking the video. He is still a legend in Italy and lots of money is made off his songs and image.
@@riva1958 Thanks for the knowledge !
30:00 The Presenter tells the French spokesperson to shhh 🤣
It was strongly rumoured, and discussed openly apparently afterwards by some of the delegations, that this contest saw the first evidence of tactical voting. Not voting tactically to hope their country might win, but to prevent others from winning. Italy didn't want France, who were hot favourites, to win, although one jury member rebelled, and not many people in the music business wanted Italy to win as Domenico wasn't liked by any of the musicians in Europe due to his diva behaviour after the success of Volare, as it came to be known. Many of the TV company executives were actively campaigning against him.
The Top 3 performing again was rehearsed and always planned. Each country rehearsed a short reprise sequence with the orchestra. It was brought in to help promote the non-winning entries and maybe assist in sales. However the actual artists didn't like the idea and it was not done again. When the Top 3 presentations were done in 1971, the artists who came second and third said they felt humiliated and that's why it was again never repeated.
Great knowledge!
7 points from Italy, I guessed they liked the song a bit more than een beetje 😉
Did I just hear a drum and cymbals 😹😹
As usual, your videos are wonderful! ❤
Some Euro Geek stuff about 1959.
Brita Borg didn't sing in the Swedish National Final. Although it was known she would go to Eurovision, all the songs were sung by other artists. Augustin was sung by Sir Malmkvist.
Jacques Pills was the father of Jacqueline Boyer who would win the following year. Jacques was at one time married to Edith Piaf and therefore Edith was technically Jacqueline's step-mother for 2 years.
The venue Palais De Festivals is one of the Eurovision venues that no longer exists. It was demolished in the early 1980's and a new venue, with the same name, erected elsewhere. Many Eurovision sites, including the EBU, show pictures of the new building by mistake.
Ferry Graf moved to Finland in the 1970's, became a Finnish citizen and formed a Hillbilly music band which did Finnish and German versions of Elvis songs.
Jean Phillipe appeared in the UK crime/musical Jazz Boat as the owner of a nightclub in London and sang Qui Qui Qui Qui Qui. A backing vocal is partly sung in English in the film but no English version was ever recorded.
Teddy Scholten is one of 10 Eurovision winners who have died. Jacqueline Joubert is one of 13 presenters who have gone.
As well as Jacquline, we have lost a number of singers from 1959. They are: Domineco Modugno - Italy, Jacques Pills - Monaco, Teddy Scholten - Netherlands, Brita Borg - Sweden, Bob Benny - Belgium, Christa Williams - Switzerland, Ferry Fraf - Austria, Teddy Johnson UK & Pearl Carr UK.
I’m guessing the 13 presenters no longer with us are: Lohengrin, Hannie, Jacqueline, Katie, Renata, Erica, Moira, Corry, Leon, Daniel, Helga (from 1990, not 1973), Gerry and Terry?
Yes! Have been awaiting this!
6:37 - it’s no loss ! Any self-respecting Eurovision fan already knows the song and can sing along making their backing in anyway they see fit !
Jacqueline was terrifying! Her whole vibe just screams “schoolmistress” whether it’s the very conservative dress, the pointing stick and the scolding of the
spokespersons. Not to mention the very rude calling up of each country: “À VOUS, LA SUISSE!”
Of course we’ll see her again as part of your project, and rather soon...
From what I can tell, in the mid-1960s, she was more likely to be directing programmes instead of fronting them, and since she mainly worked in children’s television, probably best as she would have terrified the poor children. Interestingly, her predecessor as Eurovision presenter also mainly worked in children’s television.
Fun fact: she’s the mum of Antoine de Caunes (of Eurotrash fame!)
The Antoine de Caunes fact is amazing!! Yes she seems very qualified at doing a lot in television, and actually I would say she's ideal as a Eurovision host...even at this early stage it's quite a complex job!
@@thereorderboard yes, I believe she was the “Grande Dame” of RTF, and was obviously highly-regarded, as she’d do the job again! Though unlike Katie and Petra, she is rather forgotten as someone who presented the contest more than once.
That Antoine de Caunes fact is incredible! From strict schoolmistress styles to rebellious European television, who'dve thunk it 😅
In general I liked the way she did it. In too many of the early contests the speakerine gave very little info during the voting.
that backdrop idea
It's most definitely a French commentary. At 19:38, he sais "ça va nous en faire trois" - that makes three points for us.
A nice trick with the carousel. As for my favourite song, the United Kingdom probably (though France and Austria come close).
The first of 16 second-places (and the first of two behind the Netherlands) [*sigh*]
3 countries didn't do as they were told
Belgium didn't give points in performance order
Denmark and Switzerland went too fast.
Thankfully the UK didn’t use a real bird in their performance, it would have shat on them having to listen to that…
I do love the French word for “continuity announcer” which is “speakerine.” We’ll meet a lot of speakerines in the early years of the contest!
No slagging allowed on Een Beetje.
Is that the first Eurovision wolf whistle given to the German twins?
I meant to say this before but forgot, I wonder if the scores had been relayed to Cannes before the voting opened, or at least during the voting but before each country voted? The 'automatic' scoreboard worked so seamlessly that it was almost like magic. I know that the following year in London [and possibly again in Cannes in '61] the scores were noted from the jury spokesperson to the person who was their initial contact [think of the woman sitting at the desk beside Anaid Iplicjian the Presenter in 1957 and the person Hannie Lips in 1958 was asking on the telephone to contact her with the juries] before being transmitted live. I presume this was in case there was a break in the midst of one countries scores when they'd only given half of them.
Yes I can only assume that there was a safety mechanism in place, considering how ropey some of the lines were in the 1980s, let alone the 50s! The 59 board did seem remarkably accurate, but then that display unit is used multiple times (I think as late at 1967), so maybe it was just very good! At one point in 1960, Boyle mentions not being able to hear 'the playback', which I thought was an interesting choice of phrase. Noting her uniform method of calling up the juries, I wondered if a tape recording was being played, but then there's an error with Austria and the spokesperson says something that suggests his audio is live. 'Play back' could just be her term for 'relay' though! Plenty more when I put that video up next week.
@@thereorderboard Yes it is weird it works so quickly in 1959 given the fact someone has to count up and add the score and then get it on the board. The numbers are small but even so it goes suspiciously smoothly.
I wonder if Katie in 1960 is wearing an earpiece? Would they be worn back then? When she says at the start of the voting, 'I can hear nothing', I know she is speaking to the control box not the audience. It's as though she hasn't been switched on. I have a photograph of me standing in the spot she's on doing her 'I can hear nothing' pose.
The scoreboard in 1967 was still being worked manually by students on ladders so someone somewhere was quickly counting on their fingers.
Excellent work again by the way.
@@thereorderboard I think 1973 was the last time scores were shown on a scoreboard like that. The switch to split-flap numbers by the BBC for ‘68 was a step back, because it was back to having to flip through the numbers until the correct ones was reached.
@@riva1958 and those students did a terrible job, as we’ll see when 1967 is covered. Oddly, the scoreboard works fine in Vienna for the most part, with about five juries left it all goes haywire. I can only imagine Erica thinking she was almost home and dry with a few juries left…not to be.
@@mrjdsworld80 1968 was an electronic scoreboard and was bang on trend. There are many retro clocks that work the same way for sale. I have one myself. The numbers still flick over, that was just the trendy style of the thing, but it is worked electronically not by hand.The operator only had to enter the total amount, not press the button for each individual vote.
I can tell that the our entry "Augustin" had a more speedy arrangement from the beginning with Siw Malmkvist who won our national final (the first Melodifestivalen ever) but for some odd reason she was not sent, neither did we send any conductor, probably why the song got slower arrangment in Cannes, had we gone with the more uptemp arrangement and Siw Malmkvist, we would have done better I think
Haha she won Melodifestivalen in 1959 and 1961 but only went to Eurovision in 1960 for Sweden :P
@@nadirhajjour She also represented Germany in 69
Primaballerina
@@kaitlinbilous4605 I know, that's why I said 'for Sweden'
Pity the Woman. Didn't listen
Sweden?? Speaking in French??
Sweden gave their votes in French quite a bit in the early days when the contest was held in a Francophone country. As you’ll see when we get to 1966, the presenter can’t hide her joy that they do.
@@mrjdsworld80 And the Netherlands too! Though the fact that the Netherlands also gave scores in French in 1979 in Jerusalem came as a bit of a surprise to me...
@@JeSuisRene they paid for that language course and they’re going to use it!
@Miro Heinonen Yes. And out of all the ones who were to speak in English, Austria comes as a surprise to me 😹
SPEAK SLOWLY PLEASE