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The Eurovision Song Contest 1977 was the 22nd edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. It took place in London, United Kingdom, following the country's victory at the 1976 contest with the song "Save Your Kisses for Me" by Brotherhood of Man. Organised by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and host broadcaster British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), the contest was held at the Wembley Conference Centre on 7 May 1977, marking the first time the event took place in the month of May since the first contest in 1956.[1] The contest was hosted by English journalist Angela Rippon.

Eurovision Song Contest 1977
Dates
Final	7 May 1977
Host
Venue	Wembley Conference Centre London, United Kingdom
Presenter(s)	Angela Rippon
Musical director	Ronnie Hazlehurst
Directed by	Stewart Morris
Executive supervisor	Clifford Brown
Executive producer	Bill Cotton
Host broadcaster	British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)
Opening act	An aerial tour of the four constituent countries of the United Kingdom
Interval act	Acker Bilk and his Paramount Jazz Men
Website	eurovision.tv/event/london-1977
Participants
Number of entries	18
Debuting countries	None
Returning countries	Sweden
Non-returning countries	Yugoslavia
Participation map      Participating countries     Countries that participated in the past but not in 1977
Vote
Voting system	Each country awarded 12, 10, 8-1 points to their 10 favourite songs
Nul points in final	None
Winning song	France "L'oiseau et l'enfant"
1976 ← Eurovision Song Contest → 1978

Eighteen countries participated in the contest; Sweden returned after its absence from the previous edition, while Yugoslavia decided not to enter.

The winner was France with the song "L'oiseau et l'enfant", performed by Marie Myriam, written by Joe Gracy, and composed by Jean-Paul Cara. The United Kingdom, Ireland, Monaco and Greece rounded out the top five. Greece's fifth place finish was their best result up to that point. France' fifth win was also a record at the time, and one that France held onto for six years, until being equalled by Luxembourg in 1983.

Location

London is the capital city of England and the United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in Europe by most measures. London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history goes back to its founding by the Romans, who named it Londinium.[2]

Wembley Conference Centre was chosen to host the contest. The venue was the first purpose-built conference centre in the United Kingdom, and opened on 31 January 1977 - making it a newly built venue at the time. It was demolished in 2006.

Format

The language rule was brought back in this contest, four years after it had been dropped in 1973. However Germany and Belgium were allowed to sing in English, because they had already chosen the songs they were going to perform before the rule was reintroduced.

This was most possibly the Eurovision with the most scoring mistakes, as the scrutineer Clifford Brown had to stop the host Angela Rippon several times to correct the scores. For the first time in the contest's history, the flags of the competing nations were displayed on the scoreboard next to the country's name.

Participating countries

Tunisia was set to participate in the contest and had been drawn to participate in fourth place, but later withdrew.[1] Yugoslavia decided not to enter this contest and would not return to the contest until 1981 (they did however still broadcast the show), while Sweden returned to the competition, having missed out the year before.[3] This made for eighteen participating nations.

The Belgian act Dream Express had created some controversy in the press with reports that the three female members would wear transparent tops; this did not materialise for the actual event.[4]

The British conductor Ronnie Hazlehurst used an umbrella and wore a bowler hat during the UK entry.[5][6]

Conductors

Each performance had a conductor who led the orchestral accompaniment.[7][8]

Returning artists

Artist	Country	Previous year(s)
Michèle Torr	Monaco	1966 (for  Luxembourg)
Beatrix Neundlinger and Günter Grosslercher (as part of Schmetterlinge)	Austria	1972 (as part of The Milestones)
Patricia Maessen, Bianca Maessen, and Stella Maessen (as part of Dream Express)	Belgium	1970 (for  Netherlands as Hearts of Soul)
Ilanit	Israel	1973
Fernando Tordo (as part of Os Amigos)	Portugal	1973
Paulo de Carvalho (as part of Os Amigos)	Portugal	1974
The Swarbriggs	Ireland	1975

Participants and results

The following tables reflect the final official scores, verified after the contest transmission. During the voting sequence of the live show, several errors were made in the announcement of the scores, which were then adjusted after the broadcast. Both Greece and France duplicated scores, awarding the same points to multiple countries. From the Greek scores, The UK, Netherlands, Austria and Finland all had 1 point deducted after the contest and from the French scores, Austria, Germany, Israel, Italy and Belgium all had 1 point deducted. None of the adjustments affected the placing of any of the songs.

R/O	Country	Artist	Song	Language[9][10]	Points	Place[11]
1	Ireland	The Swarbriggs Plus Two	"It's Nice to Be in Love Again"	English	119	3
2	Monaco	Michèle Torr	"Une petite française"	French	96	4
3	Netherlands	Heddy Lester	"De mallemolen"	Dutch	35	12
4	Austria	Schmetterlinge	"Boom Boom Boomerang"	German[lower-alpha 1]	11	17
5	Norway	Anita Skorgan	"Casanova"	Norwegian	18	14
6	Germany	Silver Convention	"Telegram"	English	55	8
7	Luxembourg	Anne-Marie B	"Frère Jacques"	French	17	16
8	Portugal	Os Amigos	"Portugal no coração"	Portuguese	18	14
9	United Kingdom	Lynsey de Paul and Mike Moran	"Rock Bottom"	English	121	2
10	Greece	Pascalis, Marianna, Robert and Bessy	"Mathima solfege" (Μάθημα σολφέζ)	Greek	92	5
11	Israel	Ilanit	"Ahava Hi Shir Lishnayim" (אהבה היא שיר לשניים)	Hebrew	49	11
12	Switzerland	Pepe Lienhard Band	"Swiss Lady"	German	71	6
13	Sweden	Forbes	"Beatles"	Swedish	2	18
14	Spain	Micky	"Enséñame a cantar"	Spanish	52	9
15	Italy	Mia Martini	"Libera"	Italian	33	13
16	Finland	Monica Aspelund	"Lapponia"	Finnish	50	10
17	Belgium	Dream Express	"A Million in One, Two, Three"	English	69	7
18	France	Marie Myriam	"L'oiseau et l'enfant"	French	136	1

Detailed voting results

Detailed voting results[12][13]

		Total score	Ireland	Monaco	Netherlands	Austria	Norway	Germany	Luxembourg	Portugal	United Kingdom	Greece	Israel	Switzerland	Sweden	Spain	Italy	Finland	Belgium	France
Contestants	Ireland	119		8	1	5	12	5	8	1	12	10	12	8	12	4	8		3	10
	Monaco	96	5			8	1	6	1	6	7	12	2	6	10	8	12	5	2	5
	Netherlands	35	3	3							1	1	1	7		1			10	8
	Austria	11		5			2					3						1
	Norway	18							3	2	2				1		5		5
	Germany	55	1	1	3	2			2	8	8	8	5		5	5	6			1
	Luxembourg	17	2													7		8
	Portugal	18		2	2			1						4			3			6
	United Kingdom	121		12	7	12	7	10	12	12			8		8	3	2	4	12	12
	Greece	92		10	10	4	4	4	6	10	5		3	1	7	12	1	6	6	3
	Israel	49	7	7	5	3	5							10	3	6			1	2
	Switzerland	71	6			10	10		5	4	4	6	4				4	10	8
	Sweden	2						2
	Spain	52			6	1		7	7		3	4		3			7	7	7
	Italy	33	8	6				3		3				2		2		2		7
	Finland	50	12		4	6	8					2	7	5	2					4
	Belgium	69	4		12		6	8	4	7	10	5	6		4			3
	France	136	10	4	8	7	3	12	10	5	6	7	10	12	6	10	10	12	4

12 points

Below is a summary of all 12 points in the final:

N.	Contestant	Nation(s) giving 12 points
6	United Kingdom	Austria,  Belgium,  France,  Luxembourg,  Monaco,  Portugal
4	Ireland	Israel,  Norway,  Sweden,  United Kingdom
3	France	Finland,  Germany,  Switzerland
2	Monaco	Greece,  Italy
1	Belgium	Netherlands
	Finland	Ireland
	Greece	Spain

Spokespersons

This section needs additional citations for verification. (July 2021)

Listed below is the order in which votes were cast during the 1977 contest along with the spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for their respective country.

Broadcasts

This section needs additional citations for verification. (July 2021)

Each national broadcaster also sent a commentator to the contest, in order to provide coverage of the contest in their own native language. In addition to the participating countries, the contest was also reportedly broadcast in Algeria, Denmark, Iceland, Jordan, Morocco, Tunisia, Turkey and Yugoslavia, in Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania and the Soviet Union via Intervision, and in Hong Kong.[8]

Broadcasters and commentators in participating countries

Country	Broadcaster(s)	Commentator(s)	Ref(s)
Austria	FS1	Ernst Grissemann [de]	[14]
	Hitradio Ö3	Hubert Gaisbauer [de]
Belgium	BRT TV1	Dutch: Luc Appermont	[15]
	RTB1	French: Patrick Duhamel	[16]
	BRT Radio 1	Dutch: Nand Baert [nl] and Herwig Haes
	RTB La Première	French: André Zaleski
Finland	YLE TV1	Erkki Toivanen
	Yleisohjelma	Matti Paalosmaa [fi]
France	TF1	Georges de Caunes	[17]
	France Inter	Gérard Klein [fr]
Germany	Deutsches Fernsehen	Werner Veigel
	Deutschlandfunk/Bayern 2	Wolf Mittler
Greece	EIRT	Mako Georgiadou [el]
	Proto Programma	Dimitris Konstantaras [el]
Ireland	RTÉ	Mike Murphy
	RTÉ Radio	Liam Devally
Israel	Israeli Television	No commentator
Italy	Rete 1 and Rai Radio 1	Silvio Noto
Luxembourg	RTL Télé Luxembourg	Jacques Navadic
	RTL	André Torrent [fr]
Monaco	Télé Monte Carlo	Georges de Caunes
Netherlands	Nederland 2	Ati Dijckmeester [nl]	[18]
Norway	NRK	John Andreassen
	NRK P1	Erik Heyerdahl [no]
Portugal	I Programa	Júlio Isidro
	RDP Programa 1	Amadeu Meireles [pt]
Spain	Primera Cadena	Miguel de los Santos [es]
Sweden	SR TV1	Ulf Elfving
	SR P3	Ursula Richter [sv] and Åke Strömmer
Switzerland	TV DRS	German: Theodor Haller [de]	[19]
	TSR	French: Georges Hardy [fr]	[17]
	TSI	Italian: Giovanni Bertini
	RSR 1	French: Robert Burnier	[20]
United Kingdom	BBC1	Pete Murray	[8][21]
	BBC Radio 2	Terry Wogan	[8]

Broadcasters and commentators in non-participating countries

Country	Broadcaster(s)	Commentator(s)	Ref(s)
Denmark	DR TV	Claus Toksvig
Greenland	KNR		[22]
Hong Kong	TVB Pearl (delayed broadcast on 9 May 1977)	Un­known	[23]
	RTV RTV-2 (delayed broadcast on 9 May 1977)	Un­known	[24]
Iceland	Sjónvarpið	No commentator	[25]
Yugoslavia	TVB 2	Serbo-Croatian: Milovan Ilić
	TVZ 1	Serbo-Croatian: Oliver Mlakar
	TVL 1	Slovene: Tomaž Terček [sl]

Incidents

Strike at BBC

As noted in The Eurovision Song Contest – The Official History by author and historian John Kennedy O'Connor, the contest was originally planned to be held on 2 April 1977, but because of a strike of the BBC cameramen and its technicians, it got postponed for a month. As a result, this is the first Eurovision Song Contest to be staged in May since the inaugural edition.[1]

Postcards

Due to strikes by the BBC camera staff, and lack of time to organise the contest, there were no postcards for the viewers in between the songs. However, various shots of the contests audience were shown, with the various countries' commentators informing the viewers of the upcoming songs. The intended postcards had been devised using footage of the artists in London during a party hosted by the BBC at a London nightclub. When the postcards were seen for the first time by the participant heads of delegation at the Friday dress rehearsal the day before the grand final, the delegation from NRK Norway objected to the way their young artist was portrayed. However, as it was not possible for the BBC to edit or revise footage, all the postcards had to be dropped from the broadcast. Footage from the party still formed the interval act broadcast prior to the voting sequence.[26]

See also

• OTI Festival 1977

Notes

References

External links

• Official website

На других языках

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- [en] Eurovision Song Contest 1977

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[ru] Евровидение-1977

Конкурс песни Евровидение 1977 — 22-й конкурс песни «Евровидение». Он прошёл 7 мая 1977 года в Лондоне на сцене Конгресс-центра в Уэмбли.

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