Eurovision Song Contest 1970

Eurovision Song Contest 1970
Dates
Final	21 March 1970
Host
Venue	RAI Congrescentrum Amsterdam, Netherlands
Presenter(s)	Willy Dobbe
Conductor	Dolf van der Linden
Director	Theo Ordeman
Executive supervisor	Clifford Brown
Host broadcaster	Nederlandse Omroep Stichting (NOS)
Interval act	The Don Lurio Dancers
Participants
Number of entries	12
Debuting countries	None
Returning countries	None
Withdrawing countries	Finland  Norway  Portugal  Sweden
Participation map      Participating countries     Countries that participated in the past but not in 1970
Vote
Voting system	Each country had 10 jury members who each cast one vote for their favourite song.
Nul points	Luxembourg
Winning song	Ireland "All Kinds of Everything"
Eurovision Song Contest
◄1969 • 1970 • 1971►

The Eurovision Song Contest 1970 was the 15th Eurovision Song Contest, held on 21 March 1970 at the RAI Congrescentrum in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The Amsterdam contest is regarded as one of the most significant in Eurovision history for a number of reasons.^[1] Ireland won with seventeen-year-old Dana and a song called "All Kinds of Everything".

Ireland's win was their first. The UK came second for the seventh time, six votes behind Ireland. Luxembourg received zero votes for the only time.

Location

RAI Congrescentrum, Amsterdam - host venue of the 1970 contest.

Due to there being four winners in the previous contest, a question was raised as to which nation would host the 1970 Eurovision. With the UK having hosted the 1968 Contest and Spain the 1969 Contest, only France and Netherlands were in consideration. A toss of a coin resulted in the host country being decided as the Netherlands.^[2]

The Congrescentrum, venue of the 1970 contest, is a semi-permanent exhibit at the Ferdinand Bolstraat to Amsterdam, and was opened on 31 October 1922. This building was replaced in 1961 by the current RAI building on Europe's Square. The current congress and event center on Europe Square, was designed by Alexander Bodon and opened on 2 February 1961.

Format

The Dutch producers were forced to pad out the show as only 12 nations decided to make the trip to Amsterdam. The result was a format which has endured almost to the present day. An extended opening sequence (filmed in Amsterdam) set the scene, while every entry was introduced by a short video 'postcard' featuring each of the participating artists, ostensibly in their own nation. However, the 'postcards' for Switzerland, Luxembourg and Monaco were all filmed on location in Paris (as was the French postcard).^[3] Interestingly, the long introduction film (over four minutes long) was followed by what probably is one of the shortest ever introductions by any presenter. Willy Dobbe only welcomed the viewers in English, French and Dutch, finishing her introduction after only 24 seconds. On screen captions introduced each entry, with the song titles listed all in lower case and the names of the artist and composers/authors all in capitals.

The set design was devised by Roland de Groot; a simple design was composed of a number of curved horizontal bars and silver baubles which could be moved in a variety of different ways.

To avoid an incident like in 1969, a tie rule was created. It stated that, if two or more songs gained the same number of votes and were tied for first place, each song would have to be performed again. After which each national jury (other than the juries of the countries concerned) would have a show of hands of which they thought was the best. If the countries tied again, then they would share first place.

Participating countries

Austria (who had not taken part in 1969), Finland, Norway, Portugal and Sweden boycotted this contest as they were not pleased with the result of 1969 and the voting structure.^[3] Portugal did however host a National final, being won by Sérgio Borges.^[2]

Of the participating singers, a number were already established performers. Notably, the United Kingdom sent Welsh singer and Apple recording artist Mary Hopkin, while David Alexandre Winter represented Luxembourg. The contest is also notable for the appearance of the then unknown Julio Iglesias, singing for Spain.

Voting and aftermath

Dana sings the winning song All Kinds of Everything

In the run-up to the Contest, the United Kingdom were favourites to win and also the favourite with the 50-piece orchestra. So sure of victory, the UK delegation had organised a winner's party to be thrown after the contest.^[2] In the end, the only two countries in the running were the UK and Ireland, albeit the latter holding the lead throughout the voting. Ireland took the victory with 32 points, 6 points ahead of the UK, with Germany a distant third. Luxembourg failed to score any points at all - their only time ever to do so.

Ireland won the contest with "All Kinds of Everything", penned by Derry Lindsay and Jackie Smith, and sung by another unknown, Dana, an 18-year-old schoolgirl from Derry, Northern Ireland. The song became a million-seller and the singer an international star. As the contest was held in the Netherlands this year, and the country was one of the four winners in 1969, Dana received her awards from the Dutch winner Lenny Kuhr.

Mary Hopkin scored a few more hits but downscaled her music career in 1971 after getting married. She later commented on her appearance at the Contest as humiliating and said that she hated the song she had to sing.^[2] Spanish entrant Julio Iglesias went on to achieve worldwide success in the decades that followed, becoming one of the top-selling singers of all time. Dana, meanwhile, continued to score hit singles throughout the 1970s with songs such as "Fairytale" and "It's Gonna be a Cold Cold Christmas". In the 1990s she became a politician, running for the Irish presidential election in 1997 and 2011, and becoming an MEP in 1999.

Of the other performers, Stella Maessen (of Hearts of Soul), Jean Vallée, Guy Bonnet and Katja Ebstein all took part in the Eurovision Song Contest again, the latter twice more. The following year, Austria, Finland, Norway, Portugal and Sweden all returned to the contest.

Conductors

Each performance had a conductor who maestro the orchestra.^[4]

Returning artists

For the first time, no artists from previous contests returned.^[1]

Results

Draw	Country	Artist	Song	Language[5]	Place	Points
01	Netherlands	Hearts of Soul	"Waterman"	Dutch	7	7
02	Switzerland	Henri Dès	"Retour"	French	4	8
03	Italy	Gianni Morandi	"Occhi di ragazza"	Italian	8	5
04	Yugoslavia	Eva Sršen	"Pridi, dala ti bom cvet"	Slovene	11	4
05	Belgium	Jean Vallée	"Viens l'oublier"	French	8	5
06	France	Guy Bonnet	"Marie-Blanche"	French	4	8
07	United Kingdom	Mary Hopkin	"Knock, Knock Who's There?"	English	2	26
08	Luxembourg	David Alexandre Winter	"Je suis tombé du ciel"	French	12	0
09	Spain	Julio Iglesias	"Gwendolyne"	Spanish	4	8
10	Monaco	Dominique Dussault	"Marlène"	French	8	5
11	Germany	Katja Ebstein	"Wunder gibt es immer wieder"	German	3	12
12	Ireland	Dana	"All Kinds of Everything"	English	1	32

Scoreboard

		Results
	Netherlands	7			3	3			1
	Switzerland	8	2					2	1				2	1
	Italy	5				1					2		2
	Yugoslavia	4							4
	Belgium	5						3		1				1
	France	8			1	2						2		3
	United Kingdom	26	3	2	2	4		2		2		4	4	3
	Luxembourg	0
	Spain	8			3					2		3
	Monaco	5		1			1	2			1
	Germany	12		1	1					3	4	1		2
	Ireland	32	5	6			9	1	4	2	3		2

4 points

Below is a summary of all 4 points in the final:

1.^ Netherlands gave Ireland 5 points.

2.^ Switzerland gave Ireland 6 points.

3.^ Belgium gave Ireland 9 points

International broadcasts and voting

The table below shows the order in which votes were cast during the 1970 contest along with the spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for their respective country. Each national broadcaster also sent a commentator to the contest, in order to provide coverage of the contest in their own native language. Details of the commentators and the broadcasting station for which they represented are also included in the table below.^[1]

Voting order	Country	Spokespersons	Commentator	Broadcaster
01	Netherlands	Flip van der Schalie	Pim Jacobs[6]	Nederland 1
02	Switzerland	Alexandre Burger	Theodor Haller	TV DRS
			Georges Hardy	TSR
			Giovanni Bertini	TSI
03	Italy	Enzo Tortora	Renato Tagliani	Secondo Programma
04	Yugoslavia	Dragana Marković	Milovan Ilić	Televizija Beograd
			Oliver Mlakar	Televizija Zagreb
			Tomaž Terček	Televizija Ljubljana
05	Belgium	André Hagon	Claude Delacroix[7]	RTB
			Herman Verelst	BRT
			TBC	RTB La Première
			Nand Baert	BRT Radio 1
06	France	TBC	Pierre Tchernia[7]	Deuxième Chaîne ORTF
07	United Kingdom	Colin-Ward Lewis	David Gell[8]	BBC1
			Tony Brandon	BBC Radio 1
			John Russel	British Forces Radio[2]
08	Luxembourg	TBC	Jacques Navadic[7]	Télé-Luxembourg
			Camillo Felgen	RTL Radio
09	Spain	Ramón Rivera[9]	José Luis Uribarri	TVE1
			Miguel de los Santos[10]	Primer Programa RNE
10	Monaco	TBC	Pierre Tchernia	Télé Monte Carlo
11	Germany	Hans-Otto Grünefeldt	Marie-Louise Steinbauer[11]	ARD Deutsches Fernsehen
			Wolf Mittler	Deutschlandfunk/Bayern 2
12	Ireland	John Skehan	Valerie McGovern	RTÉ Television
			Kevin Roche	Radio Éireann
-	Austria	(Non-participating country)	Ernst Grissemann	ORF
-	Greece	(Non-participating country)	TBC	EIRT
-	Norway	(Non-participating country)	No commentator	NRK[12]
-	Portugal	(Non-participating country)	Henrique Mendes	RTP1

References

External links

• Official website

Coordinates: 52°20′29″N 4°53′18″E / 52.34139°N 4.88833°E / 52.34139; 4.88833