🇮🇹 Road to Basel: Italy

The Eurovision Song Contest is celebrating its 70th anniversary. That is a wonderful milestone. We at Eurovision Universe love diving into the history of the contest. That is why we are taking a closer look at the contests of the past 70 years. 1976 For the first time, a former participant hosted the Eurovision Song Contest. It was the 1957 winner, Corrie Brokken, who was given the task at the Congress Centre in The Hague. 18 countries participated. Turkey, Malta, and Sweden dropped out, but Austria and Greece returned. There were also returning artists: Fredi for Finland, Anne-Karine Strøm of the Bendik Singers for Norway, and Sandra Reemer for the Netherlands. Anne-Karine Strøm sang a song called “Mata Hari.” For this, she received an award from the municipality of Leeuwarden, where Mata Hari came from. And then there were also Peter, Sue & Marc, for the second time. This time, they were accompanied by a clown in their song “Djambo Djambo.” The Les Humphries Singers, whom we already knew from hits like “To My Father’s House,” represented Germany. It wasn’t easy: the song by the national winner in Germany, Tony Marshall, turned out to already exist and was disqualified. A German star also participated for Luxembourg: Jürgen Marcus. This was done in almost traditionally bad French. Later big stars Al Bano and Romina Power were also present; they sang their song bilingually, which is fairly unique for Italy. One of the favorites was France. Catherine Ferry sang “Un, deux, trois” for this country. Although she did not win, Catherine Ferry did manage to score an international hit with this song, despite or perhaps because of the simple title. Brotherhood of Man The other favorite was the British group Brotherhood of Man. They had already had a big hit with “Kiss Me Kiss Your Baby” but now sang another song about kissing: “Save Your Kisses For Me”, in which it only became clear in the very last line that this was an ode from one of the singers to his three-year-old daughter. The Brotherhood of Man also managed to pull out all the stops. “Save Your Kisses For Me” was not only a hit, but has also remained one of the greatest Eurovision classics. 1977 For a moment it seemed as though a new country would make its debut, but Tunisia withdrew under pressure of the other Arab countries. After all, the intention was not to throw a party where Israel was also present. The Eurovision Song Contest was to be presented by Angela Rippon on April 2 from the Wembley Conference Centre in London. Was to be… because a strike by camera operators caused the entire event to be cancelled. In the search for a solution, the Netherlands seemed willing to take over the whole thing. Ultimately, the unions there made it clear that they did not want to be strike breakers: the Dutch camera operators would not cooperate either. The strike was eventually resolved through negotiations, and on May 7, the Song Contest was able to go ahead after all. The group Dream Express made a comeback. They once participated for the Netherlands as Hearts of Soul, now for Belgium. Michèle Torr once represented Luxembourg, now Monaco. The Portuguese group Os Amigos included no fewer than two former participants. Austria sent a protest song against the record companies: “Boom Boom Boomerang”. Monica Aspelund from Finland came with an ode to “Lapponia”. The internationally renowned Silver Convention represented Germany. Also internationally known was the British candidate Lynsey De Paul, who was already known for the hit “Sugar Me”. In a duet with Mike Moran, she now sang “Rock Bottom”, one of the favorites for the final victory. Marie Myriam But after an exciting battle between the United Kingdom and France, just like in 1976, it was France that won this time. Marie Myriam was born in Congo. She had had a minor hit in Canada, but otherwise no one knew her yet. Until the Eurovision Song Contest of 1977, where she successfully won with her song “L’oiseau et l’enfant”.