Eurovision Song Contest 1980

The Eurovision Song Contest 1980 was the 25th edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. It took place in The Hague, Netherlands, and was organised by host broadcaster Nederlandse Omroep Stichting (NOS) – which agreed to stage the event after , having won in both and , declined to host it for a second successive year – and the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). The contest was held at the Nederlands Congresgebouw on 19 April 1980 and was hosted by Dutch actress Marlous Fluitsma, although each song was introduced by a presenter from the participating nation (in some cases, this was the same person providing the commentary).

Nineteen countries took part this year, with and the previous year's winner deciding not to participate, and returning. , notably, made its only appearance in the contest.

The winner was with the song "What's Another Year", sung by Johnny Logan and written by Shay Healy.

Location

, the winner of the 1979 contest, declined to host it for the second time in a row, as the Israel Broadcasting Authority (IBA) could not fund another international production without extra resources, and the Israeli government turned down a request to extend the IBA budget. The EBU also scheduled the broadcast for the same day as the Yom HaZikaron holiday, which meant that Israel could not even participate at all, marking the only time that the previous year's winning country did not compete the following year. After Spain – the second-placed country of 1979 – and (reportedly) the United Kingdom both declined to host, the Netherlands ultimately agreed to host the show in a small-scale production. According to the first minister Yair Lapid, son of Tommy Lapid who was then the IBA director general,his father called his then counterpart at NOS and convinced him to take the "undesired honour", when he realised that the extra cost could paralyse the regular work of the IBA.

The contest took place in The Hague at the Congresgebouw (presently known as the World Forum). The venue was constructed in 1969 and had previously hosted the contest in .

Format

The venue that had hosted the , the Congresgebouw, was again chosen to stage the contest.
Because of the limited budget and time available, NOS decided to recycle several elements of the 1976 production such as several opening video sequences, the soundtrack and many pieces and elements that were being used in other broadcaster shows since then.Again, Roland de Groot took charge of the design. As with the 1977 and 1978 contests, there were no pre-filmed postcards between the songs, with a guest presenter from each nation introducing the entries. Apart from this, the presenter, Marlous Fluitsma practically presented the contest almost entirely in Dutch, with exceptions in the protocol parts and in the voting where she used French and English according to tradition. Thus, the broadcaster host spent only US$725,000 on staging the show.

During the live interval act performance of ''San Fernando'' by The Dutch Rhythm Steel and Show Band with the Lee Jackson dancers, Hans van Willigenburg intercut brief interviews with some of the participants backstage in the green room, speaking to the singers from Germany, Luxembourg, the UK, Ireland, Norway and the Netherlands, each in their own language.

Australian-born Johnny Logan, representing his parents' country , was ultimately crowned the winner with the song "What's Another Year". This was Ireland's second victory in the competition, having previously won in with "All Kinds of Everything", coincidentally also held on Dutch soil. It was also the first time that a male solo artist (albeit with backing vocals) had won the contest since Udo Jürgens won for in .

were the runner-up for this year. They would finish in second place again , before finally winning in . Germany would go on to finish second again in and , making the 1980s their most successful decade in the contest. After relatively poor placings in the two previous years, the returned to form by coming third.

Song presenters

Each of the 19 contestants was presented by a presenter from that country. Five countries took advantage and used their commentators from their respective broadcasters present in The Hague and they had the responsibility to also perform these function (Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Portugal used their television commentators, while Turkey chose their radio commentator). Each of the songs was introduced in one of the official languages ​​of the competing country.The UK presenter was incorrectly identified in the onscreen caption as 'Noel Edmunds' and the Finnish presenter as 'Heikki Haarma'.

*
* Şebnem Savaşçı
* Kelly Sakakou
*
* Mohammed Bouzidi
* Beatrice Cori
* Jørgen de Mylius
* Ulf Elfving
* Lyliam Stambac
* Heikki Harma
* Åse Kleveland (Norwegian representative in the 1966 contest, later host of the 1986 contest held in Bergen)
* Carolin Reiber
* Noel Edmonds
* Eládio Clímaco
* Marlous Fluitsma
* Évelyne Dhéliat
* Thelma Mansfield
* Mari Cruz Soriano
* Arlette Vincent

Participating countries

After Israel announced its non-participation, Morocco entered into the contest instead. Monaco also withdrew from the contest, and would not return until 2004.

Conductors

With the exception of Belgium, each performance had a conductor who directed the orchestra. This was the only contest to feature a Black conductor conducting an entry, that being Italy's conductor Del Newman.

*
* Attila Özdemiroğlu
* Jick Nacassian
* Norbert Daum
*
* Del Newman
* Allan Botschinsky
* Anders Berglund
*
* Ossi Runne
*
* John Coleman
*
* Rogier van Otterloo
* Sylvano Santorio
* Noel Kelehan
* Javier Iturralde
* ''No conductor''

Returning artists

Participants and results

Detailed voting results

The scoring system implemented in 1975 remained the same; each country had a jury who awarded 12, 10, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 point(s) for their top ten songs. However this year for the first time, countries were required to declare their scores in ascending order, 1,2,3 etc. This change made for the added excitement of waiting for each country to award their highest 12 points at the end of each voting round.

For the voting sequence, Marlous Fluitsma used a unique telephone to speak to the nineteen jury spokespersons, although the phones were simply props and were not connected.

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 1980 contest along with the spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for their respective country.

#
# Başak Doğru
# Niki Venega
# Jacques Harvey
# Kamal Irassi
#
# Bent EvoldAalborg Stiftstidende - 23/03 1980
/ref>
# Arne Weise
# Michel Stocker
# Kaarina Pönniö
# Roald Øyen
# TBC
# Ray Moore
# Teresa Cruz
# Flip van der Schalie
# Fabienne Égal
# David Heffernan
# Alfonso Lapeña
# Jacques Olivier

Broadcasts

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

Notes

References

External links

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{{Portal bar, Music

1980
Music festivals in the Netherlands
1980 in music
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20th century in The Hague
April 1980 events in Europe
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