Eurovision Song Contest 1964

The Eurovision Song Contest 1964 was the 9th edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. It took place in Copenhagen, Denmark, following Grethe & Jørgen Ingmann's win at the 1963 contest in London, United Kingdom with the song "Dansevise". It was the first time the contest took place in Denmark - also marking the first time a Nordic country hosted the event. The contest was held at Tivolis Koncertsal on Saturday 21 March 1964, and was hosted by Lotte Wæver.

Eurovision Song Contest 1964
Dates
Final	21 March 1964
Host
Venue	Tivolis Koncertsal Copenhagen, Denmark
Presenter(s)	Lotte Wæver
Conductor	Kai Mortensen
Directed by	Poul Leth Sørensen
Executive supervisor	Miroslav Vilček
Host broadcaster	Danmarks Radio (DR)
Interval act	Ballet-Harlequinade
Website	eurovision.tv/event/copenhagen-1964
Participants
Number of entries	16
Debuting countries	Portugal
Returning countries	None
Non-returning countries	Sweden
Participation map      Participating countries     Countries that participated in the past but not in 1964
Vote
Voting system	Ten-member juries awarded points (5, 3 and 1) to their three favourite songs.
Nul points	Germany  Portugal   Switzerland  Yugoslavia
Winning song	Italy "Non ho l'età"

Sixteen countries participated in the contest; Portugal made its debut, while Sweden decided not to enter after its participation the year prior.[1]

The winner was Italy with the song "Non ho l'età", performed by Gigliola Cinquetti, written by Nicola Salerno and composed by Mario Panzeri. This was Italy's first victory in the contest, which was the first victory for a Southern European country. At the age of 16 years and 92 days, Gigliola Cinquetti became the youngest winner of the contest yet; a record she held until 1986.[2]

Location

Tivolis Koncertsal, Copenhagen - host venue of the 1964 contest.

The host venue for the contest was Tivolis Koncertsal (Tivoli Concert Hall) in Denmark's capital city Copenhagen, which lies within Denmark's famous amusement park and pleasure garden Tivoli Gardens. The park, alluding by its name to the Jardin de Tivoli that existed in Paris, was opened on 15 August 1843, and is the second oldest amusement park in the world, after Dyrehavsbakken in nearby Klampenborg.[3]

Format

Each country had 10 jury members who distributed three points among their one, two, or three favourite songs. The points were totaled and the first, second, and third placed songs were awarded 5, 3, and 1 votes in order. If only one song got every point within the jury it would get all 9 points. If only two songs were chosen, the songs would get 6 and 3 points in order.[4]

A political protest occurred after the Swiss entry: a man trespassed onto the stage holding a banner that read "Boycott Franco & Salazar". Whilst this was going on, television viewers were shown a shot of the scoreboard; once the man was removed the contest went on.[5]

The immediate response of the Koncertsal audience to the Italian entry was markedly enthusiastic and prolonged and, most unusually for a contest performance, after leaving the stage Gigliola Cinquetti was allowed to return to take a second bow. Her performance was given an unscheduled repeat on British television the following afternoon. In the event, she won the most crushing victory in the history of the contest, with a score almost three times that of her nearest rival, a feat extremely unlikely ever to be beaten under the post-1974 scoring system.

As with the 1956 contest, no video recording of the actual contest performance was known to survive (although one does of the shorter winning reprise); however, like the 1956 contest, an audio recording does exist. (Videos of Cinquetti's Sanremo performance and her Eurovision winning reprise have both appeared on YouTube.) A copy of the entire contest has been found to exist in the French television archives, although it is not yet available to view online.[6] It has been speculated that the BBC also recorded the entire show, as an empty tape canister marked "Eurovision 1964" was found during a storage cleanup, but the tape was missing, presumably wiped.[7] The audio of the entire show, however, is still available online, and an unofficial release of the show has been uploaded to YouTube with press-photos and some intact video parts to supplement the audio. Kaleidoscope might have unearthed a 16mm recording of the contest in Malta, and have found the full reprise of the winning song in Germany.

Participating countries

Further information: List of countries in the Eurovision Song Contest

Sweden did not participate because of a boycott by singers. They did however broadcast it. Portugal made its début in the contest, however they became the first country to score nul points on their début. Germany, Switzerland, and Yugoslavia also scored nul points for the first time. The Netherlands became the first country to send a singer of non-European ancestry, Anneke Grönloh was of Indonesian descent.[4] The Spanish group Los TNT was the first group of three or more participants of the history of the ESC.

Returning artists

One artist returned to the contest this year, Switzerland's Anita Traversi that represented the country in 1960.[4]

Conductors

Each performance had a conductor who conducted the orchestra.[8][9]

•  Luxembourg – Jacques Denjean
•  Netherlands – Dolf van der Linden
•  Norway – Karsten Andersen
•  Denmark – Kai Mortensen
•  Finland – George de Godzinsky
•  Austria – Johannes Fehring
•  France – Franck Pourcel
•  United Kingdom – Harry Rabinowitz
•  Germany – Willy Berking
•  Monaco – Michel Colombier
•  Portugal – Kai Mortensen
•  Italy – Gianfranco Monaldi
•  Yugoslavia – Radivoje Spasić
•   Switzerland – Fernando Paggi
•  Belgium – Henri Segers
•  Spain – Rafael Ibarbia

Results

Draw	Country	Artist	Song	Language[10]	Place	Points
01	Luxembourg	Hugues Aufray	"Dès que le printemps revient"	French	4	14
02	Netherlands	Anneke Grönloh	"Jij bent mijn leven"	Dutch	10	2
03	Norway	Arne Bendiksen	"Spiral"	Norwegian	8	6
04	Denmark	Bjørn Tidmand	"Sangen om dig"	Danish	9	4
05	Finland	Lasse Mårtenson	"Laiskotellen"	Finnish	7	9
06	Austria	Udo Jürgens	"Warum nur, warum?"	German	6	11
07	France	Rachel	"Le chant de Mallory"	French	4	14
08	United Kingdom	Matt Monro	"I Love the Little Things"	English	2	17
09	Germany	Nora Nova	"Man gewöhnt sich so schnell an das Schöne"	German	13	0
10	Monaco	Romuald	"Où sont-elles passées"	French	3	15
11	Portugal	António Calvário	"Oração"	Portuguese	13	0
12	Italy	Gigliola Cinquetti	"Non ho l'età"	Italian	1	49
13	Yugoslavia	Sabahudin Kurt	"Život je sklopio krug"	Croatian	13	0
14	Switzerland	Anita Traversi	"I miei pensieri"	Italian	13	0
15	Belgium	Robert Cogoi	"Près de ma rivière"	French	10	2
16	Spain	Los TNT	"Caracola"	Spanish	12	1

Scoreboard

Dutch contestant Anneke Grönloh's dress

		Voting results
		Total score	Luxembourg	Netherlands	Norway	Denmark	Finland	Austria	France	United Kingdom	Germany	Monaco	Portugal	Italy	Yugoslavia	Switzerland	Belgium	Spain
Contestants	Luxembourg	14		3					3		5			3
	Netherlands	2				1				1
	Norway	6				5	1
	Denmark	4			1													3
	Finland	9			3	3				3
	Austria	11												5			1	5
	France	14	1					3				5	3		1			1
	United Kingdom	17		1	5		3	1	1		1					5
	Germany	0
	Monaco	15	3						5						3	1	3
	Portugal	0
	Italy	49	5	5			5	5		5	3	3	5		5	3	5
	Yugoslavia	0
	Switzerland	0
	Belgium	2										1	1
	Spain	1												1

5 points

Below is a summary of all 5 points in the final:

N.	Contestant	Voting nation
8	Italy	Austria, Belgium, Finland, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, United Kingdom, Yugoslavia
2	Austria	Italy, Spain
	United Kingdom	Norway, Switzerland
1	France	Monaco
	Luxembourg	Germany
	Monaco	France
	Norway	Denmark

Broadcasters, commentators and spokespersons

Spokespersons

Listed below is the order in which votes were cast during the 1964 contest along with the spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for their respective country.[11]

1.  Luxembourg – TBC
2.  Netherlands – Pim Jacobs
3.  Norway – Sverre Christophersen
4.  Denmark – Pedro Biker
5.  Finland – Poppe Berg
6.  Austria – Walter Richard Langer
7.  France – Jean-Claude Massoulier
8.  United Kingdom – Michael Aspel
9.  Germany – Claudia Doren
10.  Monaco – TBC
11.  Portugal – Maria Manuela Furtado
12.  Italy – Rosanna Vaudetti
13.  Yugoslavia – Oliver Mlakar (Co-host of the 1990 contest)
14.   Switzerland – Alexandre Burger
15.  Belgium – Luc Beyer de Ryke
16.  Spain – Víctor Balaguer (Spanish representative in 1962)

Broadcasters and commentators

Each national broadcaster also sent a commentator to the contest, in order to provide coverage of the contest in their own native language.

Country	Broadcaster(s)	Commentator(s)	Ref(s)
Participating countries
Austria	ORF	Willy Kralik	[11]
Belgium	RTB	French: Paule Herreman	[11][12]
	BRT	Dutch: Herman Verelst	[11]
Denmark	DR TV	Viggo Clausen	[11]
Finland	Suomen Televisio	Aarno Walli	[11]
	Yleisohjelma	Erkki Melakoski
France	Première Chaîne ORTF	Robert Beauvais	[11][12]
Germany	Deutsches Fernsehen	Hermann Rockmann	[11]
Italy	Programma Nazionale	Renato Tagliani	[11]
Luxembourg	Télé-Luxembourg	Jacques Navadic	[11]
Monaco	Télé Monte Carlo	Robert Beauvais
Netherlands	NTS	Ageeth Scherphuis	[11][13]
Norway	NRK and NRK P1	Odd Grythe	[11]
Portugal	RTP	A. Gomes Ferreira	[11]
Spain	TVE	Federico Gallo	[11]
Switzerland	TV DRS	German: Theodor Haller	[11]
	TSR	French: Robert Burnier	[14]
	TSI	Italian: Renato Tagliani
United Kingdom	BBC TV	David Jacobs	[11][9]
	BBC Light Programme	Tom Sloan
Yugoslavia	Televizija Beograd	Serbo-Croatian: Miloje Orlović
	Televizija Zagreb	Serbo-Croatian: Gordana Bonetti
	Televizija Ljubljana	Slovene: Tomaž Terček
Non-participating countries
Sweden	Sveriges TV and SR P1	Sven Lindahl	[11][15]

References

1. "Copenhagen 1964". Eurovision.tv.
2. O'Connor, John Kennedy. The Eurovision Song Contest - The Official Celebration. Carlton Books, 2015. ISBN 978-1-78097-638-9. Pages 32-33
3. Tivoli – Tivoli Gardens Copenhagen – Copenhagen Portal – Tourist Guide. Copenhagenet.dk. Retrieved on 15 August 2011.
4. "Eurovision Song Contest 1964". EBU. Retrieved 14 June 2012.
5. Tragaki, Dafni (2002). Empire of Song: Europe and Nation in the Eurovision Song Contest. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 224.
6. http://inatheque.ina.fr/doc/TV-RADIO/DA_CPF96003532/9eme-concours-eurovision-de-la-chanson-1964?rang=334
7. The Lost Tapes: BBC documentary about wiping during the 60s, aired on BBC Three in 2009
8. "And the conductor is..." Retrieved 10 July 2018.
9. Roxburgh, Gordon (2012). Songs for Europe: The United Kingdom at the Eurovision Song Contest. Volume One: The 1950s and 1960s. Prestatyn: Telos Publishing. pp. 348–358. ISBN 978-1-84583-065-6.
10. "Eurovision Song Contest 1964". The Diggiloo Thrush. Retrieved 4 March 2012.
11. "Eurovision 1964 - Cast and Crew". IMDb. Retrieved 18 July 2020.
12. Christian Masson. "1964 - Copenhague". Songcontest.free.fr. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
13. "Dokumentaire over Schiermonnikoog". De Leeuwarder Courant (in Dutch). 23 March 1964.
14. "Programme TV du 15 au 21 mars". Radio TV - Je vois tout. Lausanne, Switzerland: Le Radio SA. 12 March 1964.
15. Thorsson, Leif (2006). Melodifestivalen genom tiderna ["Melodifestivalen through time"]. Stockholm: Premium Publishing AB. p. 48. ISBN 91-89136-29-2.

External links

• Official website