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Eurovision Song Contest 1968

International song competition

Summary

International song competition

Field	Value
name	Eurovision Song Contest
year	1968
logo	Eurovision Song Contest 1968 - logo.svg
final	6 April 1968
presenter	Katie Boyle
musdirector	Norrie Paramor
director	Stewart Morris
scrutineer	Clifford Brown
exproducer	Tom Sloan
winner
"La La La"
vote	Ten-member juries in each country; each member gave one vote to their favourite song
organiser	European Broadcasting Union (EBU)
host	British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)
venue	Royal Albert Hall
London, United Kingdom
entries	17
Map NoSemis	Y

"La La La" London, United Kingdom

The Eurovision Song Contest 1968 was the 13th edition of the Eurovision Song Contest, held on 6 April 1968 at the Royal Albert Hall in London, United Kingdom, and presented by Katie Boyle. It was organised by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and host broadcaster the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), who staged the event after winning the for the with the song "Puppet on a String" by Sandie Shaw. Despite being the UK's first win at the contest, it was actually the third time that the BBC had hosted the competition, having previously done so in and , both of which also took place in London and were presented by Katie Boyle. It was the first time the event was broadcast in colour. Broadcasters from seventeen countries participated in the contest, the same countries that had participated the previous year.

The winner was with the song "La La La" by Massiel, and written/composed by Manuel de la Calva and Ramón Arcusa. This was Spain's first victory - and their first ever top five placing - in the contest.

Location

Royal Albert Hall, London - host venue of the 1968 contest.

The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) staged the 1968 contest in London, after winning the for the with the song "Puppet on a String" by Sandie Shaw. The venue selected was the Royal Albert Hall. This concert hall is known for hosting the world's leading artists from several performance genres, sports, award ceremonies, the annual summer Proms concerts and other events since its opening in 1871, and has become one of the United Kingdom's most treasured and distinctive buildings. At the time of the contest in 1968, the venue had a capacity of 7,000 seats.

Participants

Broadcasters from seventeen countries participated in the 1968 contest, the same countries that had participated in 1967.

The contest featured one representative who had previously performed as lead artists for the same country. Isabelle Aubret had won Eurovision for .

Originally Spanish broadcaster Televisión Española (TVE) entered Joan Manuel Serrat to sing "La La La", but after he demanded to sing the song in Catalan at the contest, Massiel, who was on tour in Mexico, was brought in as a late replacement. In just two weeks, she had to rush back to Spain, learn the song, record it in several languages, travel to Paris to get a dress and go to London for rehearsals. She sang the song in the contest in Spanish with a new arrangement made to fit her. In her winning reprise, she performed part of her song in English, in addition to the original version, becoming the first winner to do so. The Norwegian national selection, , ended with the song "Jeg har aldri vært så glad i noen som deg" winning performed by both Kirsti Sparboe and Odd Børre. However the composer, Kari Diesen withdrew the song due to receiving multiple accusations of plagiarism of the song "Summer Holiday" by Cliff Richard. Norsk rikskringkasting (NRK) internally selected the runner-up song in the selection, "Stress" to participate in the contest instead, and Odd Børre was chosen as the singer.

Country	Broadcaster	Artist	Song	Language	Songwriter(s)
ORF	Karel Gott	"Tausend Fenster"	German
RTB	Claude Lombard	"Quand tu reviendras"	French
YLE		"Kun kello käy"	Finnish		Ossi Runne
ORTF	Isabelle Aubret	"La Source"	French		Alain Goraguer
HR	Wencke Myhre	"Ein Hoch der Liebe"	German		Horst Jankowski
RTÉ	Pat McGeegan	"Chance of a Lifetime"	English	John Kennedy	Noel Kelehan
RAI	Sergio Endrigo	"Marianne"	Italian	Sergio Endrigo	Giancarlo Chiaramello
CLT	and	"Nous vivrons d'amour"	French		André Borly
TMC		"À chacun sa chanson"	French		Michel Colombier
NTS	Ronnie Tober	"Morgen"	Dutch		Dolf van der Linden
NRK	Odd Børre	"Stress"	Norwegian		Øivind Bergh
RTP	Carlos Mendes	"Verão"	Portuguese
TVE	Massiel	"La La La"	Spanish		Rafael Ibarbia
SR	Claes-Göran Hederström	"Det börjar verka kärlek, banne mej"	Swedish		Mats Olsson
SRG SSR	Gianni Mascolo	"Guardando il sole"	Italian		Mario Robbiani
BBC		"Congratulations"	English		Norrie Paramor
JRT	Lući Kapurso and Hamo Hajdarhodžić	"Jedan dan" (Један дан)	Serbo-Croatian		Miljenko Prohaska

Format

1968 was the first time that the Eurovision Song Contest was broadcast in colour. The countries that broadcast it in colour were France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, Sweden and the United Kingdom, although in the UK it was broadcast as an encore presentation in colour on BBC Two the next day. Many Eastern European countries as well as Tunisia broadcast the contest.

Prior to the contest, the bookmakers were sure of another British victory, as the English singer Cliff Richard, who was already dominating the music charts at that time, was hotly tipped as the favourite to win, but in the end he lost out to Spain's song by a margin of just one vote.

Contest overview

Country	Artist	Song	Votes
	"Verão"	5	11
	"Morgen"	1	16
	"Quand tu reviendras"	8	7
	"Tausend Fenster"	2	13
and Sophie Garel	"Nous vivrons d'amour"	5	11
	"Guardando il sole"	2	13
Line and Willy	"À chacun sa chanson"	8	7
	"Det börjar verka kärlek, banne mej"	15	5
	"Kun kello käy"	1	16
	"La Source"	20	3
	"Marianne"	7	10
	"Congratulations"	28	2
	"Stress"	2	13
	"Chance of a Lifetime"	18	4
Massiel	"La La La"	29	1
	"Ein Hoch der Liebe"	11	6
	"Jedan dan"	8	7

Spokespersons

Each participating broadcaster appointed a spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for its respective country via telephone. Known spokespersons at the 1968 contest are listed below.

Finland
IrelandGay Byrne
Sweden
United KingdomMichael Aspel

Detailed voting results

Due to a misunderstanding by the hostess, Katie Boyle, Switzerland was erroneously awarded 3 votes by Yugoslavia, instead of 2. The scrutineer asked for the Yugoslav votes to be announced a second time.

nb=1	Total score}}	nb=1	Portugal}}	nb=1	Netherlands}}	nb=1	Belgium}}	nb=1	Austria}}	nb=1	Luxembourg}}	nb=1	Switzerland}}	nb=1	Monaco}}	nb=1	Sweden}}
5													2		3
1											1
8	1								1	1	3	1			1
2																2
5		1		1			1			1		1
2																	2
8		2			1				3			1		1
15	1	1							1			2	6	4
1													1
20		3	6	2	3	3		1			2
7	1					2									2		2
28	1	2	2		1	4	5	3	2	4	1			1		2
2					1										1
18	1	1	1	4	1			4									6
29	4			2	1		4		3	4	3		1	1		6
11					1	1		2				5			2
8	1		1	1	1									3	1

Broadcasts

Each participating broadcaster was required to relay the contest via its networks. Non-participating EBU member broadcasters were also able to relay the contest as "passive participants". 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. In addition to the participating countries, the contest was also reportedly broadcast in Tunisia, and in Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania and the Soviet Union via Intervision, with an estimated global audience of between 150 and 200 million.

Known details on the broadcasts in each country, including the specific broadcasting stations and commentators are shown in the tables below.

Country	Broadcaster	Channel(s)
ORF	FS1
RTB	RTB	Paule Herreman
RTB 1
BRT	BRT
YLE	TV-ohjelma 1
Ruotsinkielinen ulaohjelma
ORTF	Deuxième Chaîne	Pierre Tchernia
France Inter
ARD	Deutsches Fernsehen
RTÉ	RTÉ	Brendan O'Reilly
RTÉ Radio	Kevin Roche
RAI	Secondo Programma TV
CLT	Télé-Luxembourg
NTS	Nederland 1
NRK	NRK Fjernsynet, NRK	Roald Øyen
RTP	RTP
TVE	TVE 1, TVE Canarias
RNE		José María Íñigo
SR	Sveriges TV
SRG SSR	TV DRS
TSR
TSI
Radio Beromünster	Albert Werner
BBC	BBC1
BBC Radio 1, BBC Radio 2	Pete Murray
BFBS	BFBS Radio	Thurston Holland
JRT	Televizija Beograd
Televizija Ljubljana
Televizija Zagreb

Country	Broadcaster	Channel(s)
ČST		Miroslav Horníček
MTV	MTV
MBA	MTS, National Network
TP	Telewizja Polska
WKAQ
TVR	TVR

Notes

References

René-Roger. (9 April 1968). "La chanson espagnole triomphe devant 200 millions de spectateurs". [[La Croix (newspaper).
"Eurovision Song Contest 1968". [[EBU]].
(23 July 2011). "Winners of the 1960s - What happened to them?". [[EBU]].
O'Connor, John Kennedy. (2010). "The Eurovision Song Contest: The Official History". [[Carlton Publishing Group.
"London 1968 – Participants". European Broadcasting Union.
"Alle deutschen ESC-Acts und ihre Titel". ARD.
"London 1968 – Scoreboard". European Broadcasting Union.
Murtomäki, Asko. (2007). "Finland 12 points! Suomen Euroviisut". Teos.
(6 April 1968). "To-night's television". [[The Herald (Ireland).
(2006). "Melodifestivalen genom tiderna : de svenska uttagningarna och internationella finalerna". Premium Publishing.
(2012). "Songs for Europe: The United Kingdom at the Eurovision Song Contest". [[Telos Publishing]].
"London 1968 – Detailed voting results". European Broadcasting Union.
"Eurovision Song Contest 1968 – Scoreboard". European Broadcasting Union.
(31 October 2018). "The Rules of the Contest". European Broadcasting Union.
(6 April 1968). "Alemania presenta tambien una cancion con el mismo estribillo que la Española". [[Diario de Barcelona]].
H. Hn. (8 April 1968). "Vakwerk van de B.B.C.". [[HP/De Tijd.
(13 April 1968). "Grand Prix Eurovision".
(4 April 1968). "Fernsehen und radio". {{ill.
(6 April 1968). "Televisie en radio". [[De Standaard]].
(6 April 1968). "Jatkoajalla Euroviisut". [[Helsingin Sanomat]].
(6 April 1968). "Radio ja televisio". Helsingin Sanomat.
(6 April 1968). "Téléprevision". {{ill.
(6 April 1968). "Fernsehen heute". {{ill.
(6 April 1968). "On the radio". Evening Herald.
(31 March – 6 April 1968). "Sabato {{!}} TV {{!}} 6 aprile".
(5 April 1968). "Radio-Télévision". [[Luxemburger Wort]].
(6 April 1968). "Radio en tv programma". [[Trouw]].
(6 April 1968). "TV radio". [[Oppland Arbeiderblad]].
(6 April 1968). "Programa da TV". [[Diário de Lisboa]].
(7 April 1968). "Programa para hoy". {{ill.
(6 April 1968). "Televisión". {{ill.
(6 April 1968). "Radio y television". [[Diario de Barcelona]].
(5 May 2018). "Spanish Eurovision commentator José María Iñigo passed away". European Broadcasting Union.
(6 April 1968). "TV i dag". [[Svenska Dagbladet]].
(6 April 1968). "Punkt för punkt". [[Svenska Dagbladet]].
(6 April 1968). "Fernsehen". [[Die Tat (Swiss newspaper).
(4 April 1968). "TV – samedi 6 avril".
(6 April 1968). "Settimana dal 6 al 12 4. 1968". Eco di Locarno.
(4 April 1968). "Programmes radio – lundi 8 avril".
(6 April 1968). "Eurovision Song Contest – BBC2".
(6 April 1968). "Eurovision Song Contest – BBC1".
(6 April 1968). "as Radio 2 – BBC Radio 1".
(6 April 1968). "Eurovision Song Contest – BBC Radio 2".
(2014). "Songs for Europe: The United Kingdom at the Eurovision Song Contest". [[Telos Publishing]].
(6 April 1968). "Телевизија". [[Borba (newspaper).
(6 April 1968). "RTV Ljubljana". [[Delo (newspaper).
(6 April 1968). "Televizija". [[Slobodna Dalmacija]].
(1 April 1968). "Sobota". Týdeník Československé televize.
(1 April 1968). "TV – szombat IV.6".
(3 April 1968). "Eurovíziós dalfesztivál". {{ill.
(6 April 1968). "Your Listening and Viewing". [[Times of Malta]].
(6 April 1968). "Eurovision Song Contest – Tonight's 17-Nation Event". Times of Malta.
(6 April 1968). "Telewizja". [[Dziennik Polski]].
(30 April 1968). "¡Lo que 200 millones de personas escucharon y admiraron en toda Europa!". [[El Mundo (Puerto Rico).
(6 April 1968). "tv". [[Scînteia]].

Wikipedia Source

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nb=1	Total score}}	nb=1	Portugal}}	nb=1	Netherlands}}	nb=1	Belgium}}	nb=1	Austria}}	nb=1	Luxembourg}}	nb=1	Switzerland}}	nb=1	Monaco}}	nb=1	Sweden}}
5													2		3
1											1
8	1								1	1	3	1			1
2																2
5		1		1			1			1		1
2																	2
8		2			1				3			1		1
15	1	1							1			2	6	4
1													1
20		3	6	2	3	3		1			2
7	1					2									2		2
28	1	2	2		1	4	5	3	2	4	1			1		2
2					1										1
18	1	1	1	4	1			4									6
29	4			2	1		4		3	4	3		1	1		6
11					1	1		2				5			2
8	1		1	1	1									3	1

nb=1	Total score}}	nb=1	Portugal}}	nb=1	Netherlands}}	nb=1	Belgium}}	nb=1	Austria}}	nb=1	Luxembourg}}	nb=1	Switzerland}}	nb=1	Monaco}}	nb=1	Sweden}}
5													2		3
1											1
8	1								1	1	3	1			1
2																2
5		1		1			1			1		1
2																	2
8		2			1				3			1		1
15	1	1							1			2	6	4
1													1
20		3	6	2	3	3		1			2
7	1					2									2		2
28	1	2	2		1	4	5	3	2	4	1			1		2
2					1										1
18	1	1	1	4	1			4									6
29	4			2	1		4		3	4	3		1	1		6
11					1	1		2				5			2
8	1		1	1	1									3	1

nb=1	Total score}}	nb=1	Portugal}}	nb=1	Netherlands}}	nb=1	Belgium}}	nb=1	Austria}}	nb=1	Luxembourg}}	nb=1	Switzerland}}	nb=1	Monaco}}	nb=1	Sweden}}
5													2		3
1											1
8	1								1	1	3	1			1
2																2
5		1		1			1			1		1
2																	2
8		2			1				3			1		1
15	1	1							1			2	6	4
1													1
20		3	6	2	3	3		1			2
7	1					2									2		2
28	1	2	2		1	4	5	3	2	4	1			1		2
2					1										1
18	1	1	1	4	1			4									6
29	4			2	1		4		3	4	3		1	1		6
11					1	1		2				5			2
8	1		1	1	1									3	1