Eurovision Song Contest 1965

Location

The 1965 contest took place in Naples, Italy, following the country's victory at the with the song "Non ho l'età" performed by Gigliola Cinquetti. It was the first time that Italy had hosted the event. The chosen venue was the Sala di Concerto della RAI, in the Fuorigrotta suburb of the city. A part of the production centre of the Italian public broadcaster Radiotelevisione italiana (RAI) within the city, the auditorium was built between 1958 and 1963 and had space for an audience of around 1,000 people. Naples had been chosen by RAI as the host city due to the availability of the necessary equipment within the city's production facilities, as well as to honour Naples' history as a center for music in Europe, including the prestige which the canzone napoletana holds.

Participants

Broadcasters from a new record number of eighteen countries submitted entries for the contest. returned after a one-year absence, and made its first ever appearance. For the first time in the contest's history a competing entry was performed entirely in a language which was not the official language of the country it represented, namely the which was performed entirely in English.

Three of the competing artists at this year's event represented their countries for the second time: Conchita Bautista had represented , Vice Vukov had represented , and Udo Jürgens had represented .

Production and format

The contest was produced and broadcast by the Italian public broadcaster RAI. served as director, Francesco De Martino served as designer, and Gianni Ferrio served as musical director of the RAI Orchestra comprising 48 musicians. Each participating delegation was allowed to nominate its own musical director to lead the orchestra during the performance of its country's entry, with the host musical director also conducting for those countries which did not nominate their own conductor. The event was presented by Renata Mauro and was overseen on behalf of the contest organisers, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), by Miroslav Vilček as scrutineer.

The stage design within the venue had the orchestra situated in the centre, on top a transparent dais which allowed for special lighting effects to be made during the performances. Stage left was a performance area which the majority of artists used for their performances, with a backdrop featuring the Eurovision logo, while stage right was the scoreboard. The performance area was also used by Mauro in her opening and closing remarks, and introduce the competing acts. The large pipe organ within the RAI auditorium, with over 9,000 pipes, featured prominently behind the orchestra during the contest, as well as during the voting sequence when Mauro was pictured standing in front of it.

Each country, participating through a single EBU member broadcaster, was represented by one song performed by up to two people on stage. No entry was allowed to be commercially published before 10 February 1965; this caused an issue for the , "Se piangi, se ridi" by Bobby Solo, which had won the 15th Sanremo Music Festival on 30 January, as around 240,000 copies of the single release had been available in Italy by the cut-off date. Although a small number of the other broadcasters participating in the event raised objections to the song competing, given that RAI was hosting the event, with disqualification of the host broadcaster considered impossible, and an understanding that there was little time available to select a new song, "Se piangi, se ridi" was ultimately allowed to compete.

The results of the event were determined through jury voting, with the same voting system introduced for the previous year's event retained. Each jury comprised ten individuals representing the average television viewer and radio listener; as such no individuals in the music industry, including composers, music publishers, and people employed by record companies, were able to sit on the jury. Each jury comprised twenty members, who each had three votes to award in total, which could be given to one song or divided across two or three songs. Jurors could not vote for their own country, and no abstentions were allowed. The song which was awarded the most votes received five points, the second-highest three points, and the third-highest one point. If only two songs had been awarded votes they would receive six and three points for first and second respectively, and if only one song was awarded votes they would receive nine points.

The draw to determine the running order took place on 9 February 1965 in Geneva, Switzerland. Each country's delegation was provided a 45-minute slot to rehearse with the orchestra in the contest venue. Rehearsals commenced on 17 March 1965, starting with Switzerland, followed by the UK, Spain, Italy, Germany and Austria also rehearsing on the first day. Rehearsals continued on 18 March for Norway, Portugal, Monaco, Sweden, France and Belgium, and on 19 March for Ireland, Denmark, Luxembourg, Finland, Yugoslavia and the Netherlands. Technical rehearsals were held on 20 March, followed by two full dress rehearsals ahead of the live broadcast that evening; the second dress rehearsal was also heard by the national juries.

Contest overview

The contest was held at 20 March 1965 at 22:00 (CET) and lasted 1 hour and 38 minutes. The interval act was a performance by the Italian operatic tenor Mario Del Monaco, who gave a rendition of "O sole mio", although rather than singing live he mimed his performance to a previously recorded version. The prize for the winning artist and songwriters, a medallion engraved with the Eurovision logo designed by , was presented by Del Monaco.

The winner was represented by the song "Poupée de cire, poupée de son", written by Serge Gainsbourg and performed by the French singer France Gall. It was Luxembourg's second contest win, following victory at the . The came in second for the fifth time, while placed third. , in fourth place, achieved its best-ever result, while four countries, namely , , and , finished in joint last place with nul points.

The contest was a tumultuous experience for Gall who, at 17 years old, was the youngest competitor at this year's event. During rehearsals the musicians in the orchestra were displeased with the fast tempo of the song, resorting to booing and whistling towards Gall as a form of disrespect and protest. This infuriated Gainsbourg, who insulted the orchestra and stormed out while threatening to leave Naples entirely and return to Paris, leaving Gall alone with an angry orchestra to finish the rehearsal. While the fractious relationship between Gainsbourg and the orchestra was eventually settled, the experience had a continued impact on Gall's confidence during the contest; as Gall recounted in 2015, this led to what she perceived to be a shaky and nervy performance during the event, which she believed diminished her chances of doing well in the contest. When she looked for support over the telephone from her then-boyfriend, the French singer Claude François, he supposedly reinforced her doubts, telling her she sang out-of-key. Ultimately, however, Gall would take the lead from the first round of votes, and retain the lead until the very end, beating the UK's Kathy Kirby by six points. Upon her victory, before going out on stage for the award presentation and reprise performance of the winning song, Gall called François again, who broke up with her over the phone; Kirby meanwhile, who had been the pre-contest favourite to win, was upset at losing to the young Gall and stormed into the Luxembourgish delegation's dressing room, claiming the contest had been rigged in Gall's favour, and slapped her. Gall was subsequently in tears as she went back on stage, which were interpreted as tears of joy by the assembled press.

Spokespersons

Each participating broadcaster appointed a spokesperson, connected to the contest venue via telephone lines and responsible for announcing, in English or French, the votes for its respective country. Known spokespersons at the 1965 contest are listed below.

• Finland
• NetherlandsDick van Bommel
• Sweden

Detailed voting results

Jury voting was used to determine the points awarded by all countries. The announcement of the results from each country was conducted in the order in which they performed, with the spokespersons announcing their country's points in English or French in ascending order. The detailed breakdown of the points awarded by each country is listed in the tables below, with voting countries listed in the order in which they presented their votes.

5 points

The below table summarises how the maximum points available were awarded from one country to another. The winning country is shown in bold. Luxembourg and the UK each received the maximum score from four of the voting countries; Austria, Denmark and France received two sets of maximum scores each; and Ireland, Monaco, the Netherlands and Switzerland each received one maximum score.

Broadcasts

Broadcasters competing in the event were required to relay the contest via its networks; non-participating EBU member broadcasters were also able to relay the contest. Broadcasters were able to send commentators to provide coverage of the contest in their own native language and to relay information about the artists and songs to their television viewers. These commentators were typically sent to the venue to report on the event, and were able to provide commentary from small booths constructed at the back of the venue, with 20 booths ultimately constructed for the event.

For the first time the contest was broadcast by members of the International Radio and Television Organisation (OIRT), the counterpart of the EBU within Eastern European countries, via its Intervision network. In addition to the participating countries, the contest was reportedly broadcast in Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania and the Soviet Union, with an expected global audience of 100 to 200 million. Known details on the broadcasts in each country, including the specific broadcasting stations and commentators, are shown in the tables below.

Legacy

The 1965 contest, and in particular its winner, has since been viewed as a monumental moment in the event's history. Although pop music had been present in the contest in past editions, the vast majority of songs and winners had fit more into the "chanson", "canzone" or ballad categories. "Poupée de cire, poupée de son", considered emblematic of the yé-yé genre, is thus commonly referred to as the contest's first pop winner, as well as the first winner which was more reflective of European popular music at the time, and its win had a big impact on the types of songs and performers which would be selected to compete in future contests. Following another pop winner in , the UK's Sandie Shaw and "Puppet on a String", pop songs, and in particular schlager music, would go on to become a staple of future editions of the contest, with several winners from the 1970s onwards fitting into this genre.

Although past contest entries had achieved commercial success outside of their countries of origin, no previous winner had achieved the chart success that "Poupée de cire, poupée de son" went on to accomplish in the weeks and months after the contest, reaching the top 10 in singles charts in Belgium, Finland, France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland and West Germany, as well as in Argentina, French-speaking Canada, Japan, and Singapore. Gall became one of Eurovision's first breakthrough stars, and the commercial success of "Poupée de cire, poupée de son" helped pave the way for the contest to be seen as a platform to drive forward professional careers and achieve commercial success across Europe and worldwide.

Gall and Gainsbourg, who had first developed a creative partnership in 1964 with "N'écoute pas les idoles" (""), continued to work together after the contest, spawning further hits including the controversial "Les sucettes (""); although on the surface it is a song about a girl who likes lollipops, just as with "Poupée de cire, poupée de son", Gainsbourg's lyrics were laced with subtext, in this case double meanings about fellatio. Although Gall claimed that she was too young to understand this when she recorded it, it dented her artistic image and led to a rift between herself and Gainsbourg and her career soon dipped. Upon meeting her future husband, the French singer Michel Berger, her career had a resurgence, and she only performed songs written by him in future years. This partnership led to her most successful album, Babacar, in 1987, which featured "Ella, elle l'a", which became a worldwide hit the same year. The ending of her previous relationship with Claude François would serve as inspiration for his 1967 song "Comme d'habitude"; Paul Anka would subsequently buy the rights to adapt the song into English, which would eventually become "My Way", a hit song for Frank Sinatra in 1969.

Gainsbourg returned to the contest two times as a songwriter: in 1967 he contributed another yé-yé song, "Boum-Badaboum", which represented at that year's contest where it was performed by Minouche Barelli and finished in fifth place; and in his song "White and Black Blues" performed by Joëlle Ursull came second for . Also a singer, Gainsbourg gained notoriety himself in 1969 with his song "Je t'aime... moi non plus", a duet with his then-girlfriend Jane Birkin, which although a commercial success was controversial for its overly sexual content, leading it to be banned from radio play in several countries and denounced by the Vatican.

"Poupée de cire, poupée de son" was subsequently nominated in 2005 to compete in Congratulations: 50 Years of the Eurovision Song Contest, a special broadcast to determine the contest's most popular entry of its first 50 years as part of the contest's anniversary celebrations. One of 14 entries chosen to compete, "Poupée de cire, poupée de son" ultimately finished in fourteenth place.

Although the contest had no specific rules about the language in which a song should be performed in, there was an implicit understanding that each country should perform in the language, or one of the languages of that country. While some previous entries had been partly performed in a foreign language to that country, e.g. the and , which had one verse each in French, and the , which had one verse in English, the Swedish entry at this year's entry was the first song to be performed entirely in a language other than that of the country it represented, in this case completely in English. This led to protest from several of the other broadcasters following the event, which led to a rule change being implemented for the 1966 contest, explicitly stating that all countries had to be represented by a song in one of that country's official languages. This language rule would remain until , when freedom of language was once again permitted, only to be reintroduced ahead of the ; the rule was finally abolished indefinitely for the and all future contests.

References

1. "Italy – Participation history". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
2. (2006). "Il recupero dell'auditorium RAI di Napoli".
3. "Naples 1965". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
4. Escudero, Victor M.. (3 December 2019). "Only songs performed in English do well?". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
5. (13 May 2017). "How English is the Eurovision Song Contest?". [[The Guardian]].
6. (22 June 2014). "Move over, Miss Wurst! Meet the Original Conchita". [[Wiwibloggs]].
7. (24 September 2008). "Vice Vukov dies at the age of 72". ESCToday.
8. (21 December 2014). "First Austrian winner Udo Jürgens dies". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
9. "Naples 1965 – Participants". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
10. "Alle deutschen ESC-Acts und ihre Titel". [[ARD (broadcaster).
11. (27 January 2025). "SWR übernimmt 2026 Federführung für Eurovision Song Contest". [[ARD (broadcaster).
12. S.G. Biamonte. (14–20 March 1965). "Diciotto canzoni in gara per il 'Gran Premio dell'Eurovisione'".
13. (27 March 2019). "The Organisers behind the Eurovision Song Contest". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
14. (3 April 2011). "40 years ago today – Séverine brings Monaco their sole victory". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
15. (13 September 2024). "La poupée de 60 ans: A new milestone for France Gall's Eurovision winner". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
16. S.G. Biamonte. (21–27 February 1965). "L{{' "}}Eurocazone" a Napoli: Bobby Solo come Gigliola?".
17. (17 March 1965). "Interpreti di diciotto Paesi a Napoli per l{{' '}}Eurocanzone'". [[La Stampa]].
18. Fusco, Angelo. (17 March 1965). "Diciotto in gara a Napoli per la più bella d'Europa". [[Avanti! (newspaper).
19. "Naples 1965 – France Gall". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
20. (7 January 2018). "France Gall: French singer who inspired My Way dies age 70". [[The Guardian]].
21. "Luxembourg – Participation history". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
22. (6 June 2021). "Eurovision 1965, il primo in Italia: quando l'orchestra fischiò il brano perchè 'troppo veloce'". Eurofestival News.
23. (29 September 2015). "Le "drame absolu" de France Gall – Son Eurovision cauchemardesque". [[Paris Match]].
24. (1 January 2025). "France Gall: Eurovision's first breakout success". [[The New European]].
25. (7 January 2018). "Retour sur la victoire de France Gall à l'Eurovision, 'un drame absolu'". [[20 minutes (France).
26. "Naples 1965 – Scoreboard". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
27. (31 October 2018). "The Rules of the Contest". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
28. (24 May 2021). "Lugano to Liverpool: Broadcasting Eurovision". [[National Science and Media Museum]].
29. Vaessen, Theo. (20 March 1965). "18 landen azen op het Eurovisie-goud". [[De Limburger.
30. (20 March 1965). "Gran Premio Eurovisione della Canzone 1965". {{lang.
31. "Naples 1965 – Detailed voting results". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
32. "Eurovision Song Contest 1965 – Scoreboard". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
33. (15 May 2011). "Commentator's guide to the commentators". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
34. (14 May 2017). "Commentators: The national hosts of Eurovision". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
35. (20 March 1965). "Eerst Napels zien, dan zingen". [[Het Parool]].
36. (22 March 1965). "Französin im europäischen Schlagerwettbewerb für Luxemburg erfolgreich". [[Grenz-Echo]].
37. A. L.. (20 March 1965). "Stasera a Napoli il Festival europeo con cantanti e motivi di diciotto Paesi". [[La Stampa]].
38. (13 March 1965). "Fernsehprogramm". {{ill.
39. (20 March 1965). "Radio en TV". [[De Standaard]].
40. (20 March 1965). "Télévision {{!}} À la radio". [[Le Soir]].
41. "Alle tiders programoversigter – Lørdag den 20. marts 1965". [[DR (broadcaster).
42. (20 March 1965). "Radio ja televisio". [[Helsingin Sanomat]].
43. (20 March 1965). "18 iskelmää osallistuu tänään Eurovisiokilpailuun Napolissa". [[Helsingin Sanomat]].
44. (20 March 1965). "Fernsehen heute". {{ill.
45. (20 March 1965). "TV and Radio Programmes". [[Irish Examiner.
46. (14–20 March 1965). "TV {{!}} sabato 20 marzo".
47. (14–20 March 1965). "Radio {{!}} sabato 20 marzo".
48. (20 March 1965). "Radio-Télévision". [[Luxemburger Wort]].
49. (20 March 1965). "Kijk vandaag naar". [[Limburgs Dagblad]].
50. (20 March 1965). "'Vuurwerk' van France Gall". [[Algemeen Dagblad]].
51. (20 March 1965). "Luister vandaag nar". [[Limburgs Dagblad]].
52. (20 March 1965). "Se og Hør idag". [[Oppland Arbeiderblad]].
53. (20 March 1965). "Boletim do dia". [[Diário de Lisboa]].
54. (27 March 1965). "TVE en Canarias". {{ill.
55. (28 March 2018). "Todos los comentaristas de la historia de España en Eurovisión (y una única mujer en solitario)". [[Los 40]].
56. (20 March 1965). "Radio y television". [[Diario de Barcelona]].
57. (20 March 1965). "TV i dag". [[Svenska Dagbladet]].
58. (20 March 1965). "Punkt för punkt". [[Svenska Dagbladet]].
59. (19 March 1965). "Das Fernsehen und sein Programm". [[Die Tat (Swiss newspaper).
60. (20 March 1965). "télévision". Journal de Montreux.
61. (20 March 1965). "Radio–TV". Libera Stampa.
62. (11 March 1965). "Samedi 20 mars".
63. (20 March 1965). "Eurovision Song Contest Grand Prix 1965 – BBC1".
64. (20 March 1965). "Радио Телевизија Београд". [[Borba (newspaper).
65. (20 March 1965). "RTV Ljubljana". [[Delo (newspaper).
66. (20 March 1965). "Televizija". [[Slobodna Dalmacija]].
67. (15 March 1965). "Sobota 20. března". Československý rozhlas a televise.
68. (15 April 1965). "Sie sehen und hören". [[Neue Zeit (East Germany).
69. (6 September 1965). "A TV műsora {{!}} szeptember 6-12".
70. (22 March 1965). "Eurovision Song Contest: Young Singer Wins Title for Luxembourg". [[Times of Malta]].
71. (20 March 1965). "Telewizja". [[Dziennik Bałtycki]].
72. (28 August 2016). "Milestone Moments: 1965 - Eurovision Goes Pop!". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
73. (10 May 2018). "'Schlager', Scandi-pop and sparkles: your guide to the musical styles of Eurovision". [[The Conversation (website).
74. (24 August 2017). "Throwback Thursday: Eurovision 1967". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
75. (8 July 2020). "Ja Ja Ding Dong! How schlager found its joyful place in the pop camp". [[The Guardian]].
76. (12 August 2020). "Eurovision songs in the charts!". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
77. (8 May 1965). "Hits of the World".
78. (9 June 1965). "Hits of the World".
79. (28 August 1965). "Hits of the World".
80. (27 November 1965). "Argentina's Best Sellers".
81. (27 November 1965). "Hits of the World".
82. (11 September 1965). "Hits of the World".
83. (14 May 2016). "Bigger than Waterloo: the internet's favourite Eurovision winners". [[The Guardian]].
84. (7 January 2018). "France Gall, French singer who shot to fame in 1960s, dies". [[BBC News]].
85. (28 February 2011). "Serge Gainsbourg's 20 most scandalous moments". [[The Guardian]].
86. (22 May 2005). "The 10 most x-rated records". [[The Observer]].
87. (16 June 2005). "'Congratulations' – 14 songs to compete". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).
88. "Results from the voting (Round 1 and 2)". [[European Broadcasting Union]] (EBU).