Runner-up: Switzerland 1958

There are so many things you can say about Lys Assia and Eurovision. She is the first ever winner, of course, but she was also the first internationally established star to take part in this new song contest.

She is also a steady presence, wanting to represent her country again as recently as in 2012. She has been a guest of honour at more ESC editions than even Johnny Logan.

She is one of only four acts to have competed three years in a row.

What people tend to acknowledge less often is that Lys also earned the title as First Lady of Bonkers. Her 1958 entry "Giorgio" is the first really quirky entry to find success in the contest, showing the audience it wasn't necessary to stay calm and composed at any cost.

In a furious tempo, Lys makes her way through the lyrics in a mix of German and Italian, telling the story of a heated meeting by Lago Maggiore between herself and her latin lover where they eat and drink and possibly engage is some other activity as well. Eurovision had never seen a woman as easy as this one and for most of the voting it looked like she'd bag a second victory.

A deserved 2nd place?
Yes. Funny, original and rather risqué for its time. Wouldn't have been a particularly useful winner but is the first wonderful proof that you can be totally crazy in Eurovision and get away with it.



Lys Assia - Giorgio (Switzerland 1958)

Goodbye, Alice Babs

Alice Babs - Sweden's first Eurovision entrant - has left us, aged 90. Being the first representative is a nice title, but if that would be all she is remembered for it would reduce her to far less than she was. Her being part of Eurovision history is more a co-incidence than anything else.

Hildur Alice Nilson was only fifteen years old when she made her first recording. She sang and starred in a number of films promoting jazz music to the local youth, and sweet little Alice was seen by many to be a tool of Satan, sent to seduce young people with this sinful new music.

Things were soon to change. Thanks to her being part of the Swe-Danes and performing on US television with them, Alice Babs came into demand also outside of Sweden and was heavily marketed towards an international audience.

Copyright: Decca / Image from discogs.com

She also sang sacral music with big success and managed to combine that with her love for jazz music when her biggest idol Duke Ellington wrote two of his Sacred Concers especially for her. He later said that when Alice wasn't available to sing, he needed to hire three different singers to fill her range.

Copyright: Telstar / Image from discogs.com

Another famous story about Alice is that she was so pitch perfect that the musicians used to tune their instruments after her. She was an extraordinary musician and very much loved by her audiences in Sweden and beyond.

She was already drifting away from light entertainment music when she was called in to sing Sweden's first entry for Eurovision, but she was a logical choice for a debuting broadcaster, eager to make a good impression in an international song contest.

However, the chosen song had to be slightly modified in order to avoid accusations of plagiarism and Alice refused to sing the original lyrics and demanded new ones. When the composer prohibited the song from being recorded with other lyrics than the one he wrote, Alice decided not to record it at all. "Lilla stjärna" is one of only two Swedish entries never to be recorded by its original performer, and is nothing more than a footnote or a curiosity in her impressive career.

In Hilversum, Alice ended in a honourable fourth place. Due to an error on the scoreboard, failing to register four points for the Italian entry, many Swedish media sources claimed for many years that Alice had ended in third place, beating "Volare" by a margin of one point.



Alice Babs - Lilla stjärna (Sweden 1958)

No polite points for the host

Back in the day, there was this idea that the host country automatically recieved a bucket full of complimentary points regardless of what their entry sounded like. Politeness points.

I'm not so sure about that, honestly. Wouldn't the host countries win a whole lot more often, then? In the 57 contests to date, only six occasions saw the host entry win.

In some years, the home ground entries have not exactly been drowned in points. Like in Bergen in 1986, where Norway didn't really make a splash.



Ketil Stokkan - Romeo (Norway 1986) - 12th place of 20

When Ireland first organised Eurovision back in 1971 - and went colour just for the occasion - the panel of expert jurors showed no excessive politeness anyway.



Angela Farrell - One Day Love (Ireland 1971) - 11th place of 18

Latvia had a very promising start at Eurovision and hosted the 2003 ESC in Riga, where their own act were red hot favourites to secure them a second consecutive victory. Those predictions proved a bit on the positive side and in the end, the Latvians only recieved a modest five points, all awarded by neighbour Estonia.



F.L.Y - Hello From Mars (Latvia 2003) - 24th place of 26

Swedish eurovision general was - as you all know - a contestant at the 1992 ESC in Malmö and was the opposite of a hit with the juries. Maybe he sees this year's event - hosted in his city of defeat - as a revenge for the second last place he got back then? Hopefully the 2013 Swedish entrant Robin Stjernberg will have more understanding from Europe this time around.



Christer Björkman - Imorgon är en annan dag (Sweden 1992) - 22nd place of 23

At least he should avoid the fate of the 1958 Dutch entry - the only time in history that the host country ended in the very last place.



Corry Brokken - Heel de wereld (Netherlands 1958) - Equal 9th place of 10

Tobson's winners: 1956 - 1960

I can't help it - it is in my nature to make charts and review things. Maybe it is easier to be a real Eurovision nut if you have this quality, what do I know?

But now that my big 2011 review is over and done with, I still want a running series for the blog. So I will go through Eurovision, year for year, and select my own personal winner.

No consideration has been taken to what would have been a good winner, a commercial choice et cetera. These are my favourite songs, according to my very personal preferences.

1956 - Switzerland



Lys Assia - Refrain (Switzerland 1956)

I must admit that 1956 is the year I know the least out of all. The contest, organised for the first time, hadn't found its formula as yet - and why would it? It wasn't even supposed to be more than a one-off anyway. There is no video copy available and the songs are old-fashioned to say the least.

I do have a certain fondness for "Ne crois pas", one of Luxembourg's two entries, but the eventual winner is a classy ballad in old style. Nothing that I find bewildering in any way, but a stylish opener and a good choice for first winner.

Real winner:
Lys Assia - Refrain (Switzerland)


1957 - France



Paule Desjardins - La belle amour (France 1957)

Again, this song is not one that would qualify as a personal favourite on any level, but still it is a pleasant and elegant reminder of what popular music sounded like once upon a time in an era long ago.

Paule Desjardins also performs elegantly, sporting the gracefulness and chic that France would turn into their very own trademark for many years to come in Eurovision.

Real winner:
Corry Brokken - Net also toen (Netherlands)


1958 - Switzerland



Lys Assia - Giorgio (Switzerland 1958)

Lys, present for the third consecutive edition, almost pulls a double with this entry which is, how should I phrase it, original.

An almost violently weird, tempo-filled little oddity, performed in a mix of almost all Swiss national languages, about flirtation and romance (and - highly possibly - something far more advanced than flirtation, judging from the emphasis on "molto amore" in the lyrics) by Lago Maggiore.

Most atypical compared to the very well-mannered style Switzerland mainly would come to cultivate at Eurovision throughout the years, and the first of these songs I really feel for. A classic!

Real winner:
André Claveau - Dors, mon amour (France)


1959 - Denmark



Birthe Wilke - Uh, jeg ville ønske, jeg var dig (Denmark 1959)

1959 is the first contest where I begin to feel slightly more at home - the pace and the format begin to fall into place and the songs have more evergreen qualities and be more light hearted than the years before.

This year, the eventual winner was the first to combine a catchy chorus with a little bit of tongue-in-cheek sense of humour, but the Danish entrant did it even better. Birthe Wilke, who two years earlier had set the world record for longest kiss in a eurovision entry, is in top form and is taking the edge of the heavy air of seriousness that sometimes found its way into early editions of the ESC.

Real winner:
Teddy Schoelten - Een beetje (Netherlands)


1960 - Switzerland



Anita Traversi - Cielo e terra (Switzerland 1960)

Switzerland - again! There is something about the early Swiss entries that touch a string inside of me. This is just a bagatelle of a song, but a very charming one, convincingly performed by Anita Traversi.

But already here - still in an era where all light popular music was written with some sort of orchestra in mind - we get proof that the live orchestra got in the way of some songs at Eurovision.

The recorded version of this song has a faster pace and feels more slick and less heavy than this slightly pompous live version.

All the way until the orchestra was abolished after the 1998 ESC, there were conductors who could not resist including as much orchestration as possible, just to show off their skills.

Not a practise all songs would benefit from.

Real winner:
Jaqueline Boyer - Tom Pillibi (France)