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The Eurovision Song Contest 1975 was the 20th edition of the annual
Eurovision Song Contest The Eurovision Song Contest (), sometimes abbreviated to ESC and often known simply as Eurovision, is an international songwriting competition organised annually by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), featuring participants representing pr ...
. It took place in
Stockholm Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...
,
Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...
, following the country's victory at the with the song " Waterloo" by
ABBA ABBA ( , , formerly named Björn & Benny, Agnetha & Anni-Frid or Björn & Benny, Agnetha & Frida) are a Swedish supergroup formed in Stockholm in 1972 by Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad. The group's ...
. Organised by the
European Broadcasting Union The European Broadcasting Union (EBU; french: Union européenne de radio-télévision, links=no, UER) is an alliance of Public broadcasting, public service media organisations whose countries are within the European Broadcasting Area or who ar ...
(EBU) and host broadcaster
Sveriges Radio Sveriges Radio AB (, "Sweden's Radio") is Sweden's national publicly funded radio broadcaster. Sveriges Radio is a public limited company, owned by an independent foundation, previously funded through a licensing fee, the level of which is d ...
(SR), the contest was held at
Stockholmsmässan Stockholm International Fairs ( sv, Stockholmsmässan) is a large exhibition facility that arranges trade fairs in Stockholm, Sweden. History The idea of starting a trade fair in Stockholm started with brothers Börje and Folke Claeson in 1942. ...
on 22 March 1975, and was hosted by Swedish television director
Karin Falck Anna Karin Margareta Falck (; born 6 February 1932) is a Swedish television director, hostess and producer. Career Karin Falck was born in Säffle, Värmland County and lived her first six years of life in Karlstad. She moved with her mother an ...
. It was the first time that the contest had taken place in Sweden. Nineteen countries participated in the contest, beating the previous record of eighteen, that was first set in the
1965 Events January–February * January 14 – The Prime Minister of Northern Ireland and the Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland meet for the first time in 43 years. * January 20 ** Lyndon B. Johnson is Second inauguration of Lyndo ...
edition.
France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
and
Malta Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...
returned after their one-year and two-year absences, respectively.
Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...
made its debut, while
Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders with ...
decided not to enter after its debut the year prior. The winner of the contest was the
Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...
who won with the song "
Ding-a-dong "Ding-a-dong" (original Dutch title: "Ding dinge dong", as it was introduced in the titles when broadcast) was the title of the winning song in the Eurovision Song Contest 1975. It was sung by Teach-In, representing the , and was written by Di ...
", performed by
Teach-In A teach-in is similar to a general educational forum on any complicated issue, usually an issue involving current political affairs. The main difference between a teach-in and a seminar is the refusal to limit the discussion to a specific time fr ...
, written by Will Luikinga and
Eddy Ouwens Eddy Ouwens (born 30 May 1946, Rotterdam), also known as Danny Mirror, is a Dutch musician and record producer. Overview He was a founder member in 1966 of the Rotterdam-based group, Eddy Nelson & the Eddysons. After a few hits he left to work ...
, and composed by Dick Bakker. The country would not win again until .


Location

The contest took place in
Stockholm Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...
, the capital and largest city of
Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...
, which has long been one of the country's
cultural Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and Social norm, norms found in human Society, societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, Social norm, customs, capabilities, and habits of the ...
,
media Media may refer to: Communication * Media (communication), tools used to deliver information or data ** Advertising media, various media, content, buying and placement for advertising ** Broadcast media, communications delivered over mass el ...
,
political Politics (from , ) is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status. The branch of social science that studies ...
, and
economic An economy is an area of the Production (economics), production, Distribution (economics), distribution and trade, as well as Consumption (economics), consumption of Goods (economics), goods and Service (economics), services. In general, it is ...
centres as well as the most populated urban area in
Scandinavia Scandinavia; Sámi languages: /. ( ) is a subregion#Europe, subregion in Northern Europe, with strong historical, cultural, and linguistic ties between its constituent peoples. In English usage, ''Scandinavia'' most commonly refers to Denmark, ...
. The venue for the contest was Stockholmsmässan (or ''Stockholm International Fairs'' in
English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...
). The main building is in
Älvsjö Älvsjö () is a district of the city of Stockholm Municipality in Sweden, located in the borough Älvsjö in Söderort. It has the biggest rentable facility in northern Europe called Stockholm International Fairs, and also the hotel Scandic Ta ...
– a southern suburb of
Stockholm Municipality Stockholm Municipality or the City of Stockholm ( sv, Stockholms kommun or ) is a municipality in Stockholm County in east central Sweden. It has the largest population of the 290 municipalities of the country, but one of the smallest areas, maki ...
for which the building got its nickname. It was constructed in 1971 and holds 4,000 people.


Format

To introduce each song, all the artists were recorded on videotape painting a portrait of themselves during the rehearsal period, incorporating their nation's flag into the illustration. Some artists included their backing artists in the painting, others chose only to paint the lead singer. This year a new scoring system was implemented. Each country would be represented by a jury of 11 members, at least half of whom had to be under the age of 26. Each jury member had to award every song a mark of between 1 and 5 points, but could not vote for their own nation's entry. The votes were cast immediately after the song was performed and collected by the adjudicator straight away. After the last song was performed, the jury secretary added up all the votes cast and awarded 12 points to the song with the highest score, 10 to the second highest score, then 8 to the third, and so forth down to 1 point for the song ranked 10th. The 12–1 points system remained in use until . The jury spokesperson then announced the ten scores in the order the songs were presented when called upon by the hostess. The hostess Karin Falck several times confused the new system with questions like ''"How much is seven in France?"'' Unlike today, the points were not given in order (from 1 up to 12), but in the order the songs were performed. The current procedure of announcing the scores in ascending order, beginning with 1 point, was not established until
1980 Events January * January 4 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter proclaims a grain embargo against the USSR with the support of the European Commission. * January 6 – Global Positioning System time epoch begins at 00:00 UTC. * January 9 – ...
. This scoring system remained in use until
1996 File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A Centennial Olympic Park bombing, bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical Anti-abortion violence, anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 8 ...
, although the number of jurors varied (it was 11 from 1975 to 1987, and 16 from 1988 to 1997) and the scores they awarded each song increased to 10 rather than 5. In from 1997, some juries were replaced by televotes and from 1998, all countries were encouraged to televote when possible. In the 2009 final and the 2010 semi-finals, the juries were reintroduced to provide 50% of the scores. Despite these changes in how the points were decided, the 'douze points' scoring system remained in place from 1975–2015. In 2016 it was altered to each country providing two separate sets of points, however, modelled after the former model.


Participating countries

Nineteen countries took part in the contest; As a result of Turkey competing in the competition for the very first time, Greece decided not to enter after its 1974 debut in protest at the Turkish participation due to the
Turkish invasion of Cyprus The Turkish invasion of Cyprus began on 20 July 1974 and progressed in two phases over the following month. Taking place upon a background of Cypriot intercommunal violence, intercommunal violence between Greek Cypriots, Greek and Turkish ...
that had occurred the year before. Meanwhile, France and Malta returned to the contest after having been absent for one and two years, respectively . The Portuguese entry " Madrugada" was an unabashed celebration of the
Carnation Revolution The Carnation Revolution ( pt, Revolução dos Cravos), also known as the 25 April ( pt, 25 de Abril, links=no), was a military coup by left-leaning military officers that overthrew the authoritarian Estado Novo regime on 25 April 1974 in Lisbo ...
, during which the country's 1974 Eurovision entry had played a pivotal practical role. According to author and historian John Kennedy O'Connor in his book ''The Eurovision Song Contest – The Official History'', the Portuguese performer had to be dissuaded from wearing his Portuguese army uniform and carrying a gun onto the stage. Some competitors (notably Portugal and Yugoslavia) opted to perform their songs in English for the rehearsals heard by the judges, but in their native tongue at the final. Others, such as Belgium and Germany, opted for a mix of their own language and English.


Conductors

Each performance had a conductor who conducted the orchestra. *
Harry van Hoof Harry van Hoof (born 16 March 1943) is a Dutch conductor, composer and music arranger. Van Hoof has written many successful productions to his name already, he has his own production company and he had his first success as an arranger with "Sof ...
*
Colman Pearce Colman Pearce (born 22 September 1938) is an Irish pianist and conductor. Born in Dublin, Pearce was educated at University College Dublin and studied conducting in Hilversum and Vienna. He became a conductor for the RTÉ Concert Orchestra in ...
* * *
Phil Coulter Philip Coulter (born 19 February 1942) is an Irish musician, songwriter and record producer from Derry, Northern Ireland. He was awarded the Gold Badge from the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors in October 2009. Coulter ha ...
* Carsten Klouman * * *
Alyn Ainsworth Alyn Ainsworth (24 August 1924 – 4 October 1990)
was a British musician, singer and conductor of light e ...
*
Vince Tempera Vince Tempera (born 18 September 1946) is an Italian musician, composer, arranger, record producer and conductor. Born in Milan as Vincenzo Tempera, he graduated in piano and composition at the Conservatory, then he started his musical activity co ...
*
Francis Bay Francis Bay (27 December 1914 – 24 April 2005) was a Belgian conductor. Born as Frans Bayezt, he conducted many Belgian entries in the Eurovision Song Contest and had his own Big band A big band or jazz orchestra is a type of mu ...
* *
Timur Selçuk Timur Selçuk (2 July 1946 – 6 November 2020) was a Turkish composer, pianist, singer and conductor. Biography One of the greatest Turkish composers, Timur Selçuk was the son of Turkish neo-classical music composer Münir Nurettin Selçuk ...
*
André Popp André Charles Jean Popp (19 February 1924 – 10 May 2014) was a French composer, arranger and screenwriter. Biography Popp was born into a family of German-Dutch background, in Fontenay-le-Comte, Vendée. He started his career as a church org ...
*
Ossi Runne Ossi Runne (23 April 1927 – 5 November 2020) was a Finnish trumpeter, bandleader, orchestra leader, composer, and record producer.
* *
Juan Carlos Calderón Juan Carlos Calderón López de Arróyabe (7 July 1938 – 25 November 2012) was a Spanish singer-songwriter and musician. Born in Santander, he was the author of "Eres tú", which, performed by Mocedades, came second in the Eurovision Song Con ...
*
Lars Samuelson Lars "Lasse" Samuelson (born Lars Samuelsson on 4 August 1935) is a Swedish musician (trumpet) and music arranger. Samuelson began his career in 1957 with playing with artists like Eva Engdahl, Seymour East Wall and Malte Johnson. In 1958 Samue ...
*


Returning artists


Participants and results


Detailed voting results


12 points

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


Spokespersons

Listed below is the order in which votes were cast during the 1975 contest along with the spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for their respective country. # Dick van Bommel #
Brendan Balfe Brendan Balfe (born 19 September 1945 in Dublin) is an Irish radio personality, who was on-air consistently for more than 40 years on RTÉ. He retired in 2010. Comedy has been a feature of many of Balfe's programmes. He has won three Internati ...
# Marc Menant # # TBC # # Michel Stocker # Dragana Marković # Ray Moore # TBC # # # Bülent Osma # Carole Chabrier # Kaarina Pönniö # Ana Zanatti #
José María Íñigo José María Íñigo Gómez (4 June 1942 – 5 May 2018) was a Spanish journalist, radio and television presenter, and stage and screen actor. Biography Career Born in Bilbao, Íñigo began his professional career in his hometown as he was hi ...
#
Sven Lindahl Sven Gustaf Lindahl (born 25 June 1937, in Stockholm) is a Swedish journalist, songwriter, radio and television presenter. As a teenager, he played in a boogie-woogie band. After leaving school, he worked briefly as a welding apprentice in Luton a ...
#


Broadcasts

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 via Intervision to Eastern European countries, and in Chile, Hong Kong, Iceland, Japan, Jordan and South Korea.


Notable incidents

Intelligence reports at the time pointed out the festival as a possible target for a terrorist attack by the
Red Army Faction The Red Army Faction (RAF, ; , ),See the section "Name" also known as the Baader–Meinhof Group or Baader–Meinhof Gang (, , active 1970–1998), was a West German far-left Marxist-Leninist urban guerrilla group founded in 1970. The ...
which forced the organizers to tighten security considerably. The attack struck the
West German West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...
embassy in Stockholm instead about a month later (see ''
West German embassy siege The West German Embassy siege in Stockholm, Sweden, was a hostage standoff initiated by the Red Army Faction (RAF) on 24 April 1975. Collectively, the attackers referred to themselves as Kommando Holger Meins, after Holger Meins, an RAF member w ...
''). The Swedish left movement protested against the contest and its commercial aspect. At first the criticism was directed towards SR for the huge amount of money they spent on the contest but soon the protests developed into a movement against commercial music overall. When the Eurovision Song Contest took place an alternative festival was organized in another part of Stockholm where anybody who wanted could perform a song. Sillstryparn's entry "Doin' the omoralisk schlagerfestival" ''(Doin' the immoral Eurovision festival)'' with lyrics criticizing the commercialised nature and lacking moral integrity of Eurovision, was the most popular song from the alternative event. In the autumn of 1975 SR informed that Sweden would not participate in the 1976 edition of the Eurovision Song Contest due to the high costs that came with hosting the show. The rules later changed so that the costs were split more equally between the participating broadcasters. In the end, SR did not broadcast the 1976 contest. A concert film starring
Cornelis Vreeswijk Cornelis Vreeswijk (; ; 8 August 1937 – 12 November 1987) was a Dutch-born Swedish singer-songwriter, poet and actor. He emigrated to Sweden with his parents in 1949 at the age of twelve. He was educated as a social worker and hoped to become ...
aired in its place. Swedish TV technicians refused to broadcast the festival to
Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...
, where Canal 13 (an associate member of the EBU) had plans to air it. The refusal was in protest to the military dictatorship that has been ruling the country since the
1973 Chilean coup d'etat Events January * January 1 - The United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland and Denmark 1973 enlargement of the European Communities, enter the European Economic Community, which later becomes the European Union. * January 15 – Vietnam War: ...
led by
Augusto Pinochet Augusto José Ramón Pinochet Ugarte (, , , ; 25 November 1915 – 10 December 2006) was a Chilean general who ruled Chile from 1973 to 1990, first as the leader of the Military Junta of Chile from 1973 to 1981, being declared President of ...
.


References


External links

* {{Portal bar, Music
1975 It was also declared the ''International Women's Year'' by the United Nations and the European Architectural Heritage Year by the Council of Europe. Events January * January 1 - Watergate scandal (United States): John N. Mitchell, H. R. ...
Music festivals in Sweden 1975 in music 1975 in Sweden 1970s in Stockholm March 1975 events in Europe