The United Kingdom held a national preselection to choose the song that would go to the

Eurovision Song Contest 1979 The Eurovision Song Contest 1979 was the 24th edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. It took place in Jerusalem, Israel, following the country's victory at the with the song "A-Ba-Ni-Bi" by Izhar Cohen and the Alphabeta. Organised by th ...

. A Song for Europe 1979 was planned to take place at the Royal Albert Hall in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

on 8 March.

Before Eurovision

A Song for Europe 1979

After a day's rehearsals at the Royal Albert Hall a strike by BBC technicians stopped the show about an hour before transmission. Audio recordings of the songs were voted on by 14 regional juries: Bristol, Bangor, Leeds, Norwich, Newcastle, Aberdeen, Birmingham, Belfast, Cardiff, Plymouth, Glasgow, Southampton and London. The jury in Manchester could not be contacted and since the winner had a more than 12 point winning margin, their scores were not included. This led to an immaterial tie for second place. The Manchester votes were later verified and added to the scores, demoting the song ''Call My Name'' down to third place. The following day, the 12 songs were broadcast on

Terry Wogan Sir Michael Terence Wogan (; 3 August 1938 – 31 January 2016) was an Irish radio and television broadcaster who worked for the BBC in the UK for most of his career. Between 1993 and his semi-retirement in December 2009, his BBC Radio 2 week ...

's Radio 2 show and a recap of the top places, plus an interview with the winners took place on the BBC TV Show Nationwide the same evening.

Final

UK Discography

*Black Lace - ''Mary Ann'': EMI EMI2919. *Lynda Virtu - ''You Are My Life'': Mercury/Utopia TANGO7. *Ipswich - ''Who Put the Shine on Our Shoes?'': Epic SEPC7195. *Herbie Flowers & the Daisies - ''Mr. Moonlight'': EMI EMI2917. *M Squad - ''Miss Caroline Newley'': Ariola ARO150. *Eleanor Keenan - ''Call My Name'': CBS SCBS7198. *Roger Whittaker - ''Call My Name'': Columbia DB9065. *Guys 'n' Dolls - ''How Do You Mend a Broken Heart?'': Magnet MAG141. *Linda Kendrick - ''All I Needed Was Your Love'': Epic SEPC7199. *Monte Carlo - ''Home Again (Living With You)'': EMI EMI2918. *Sal Davis - ''Let It All Go'': Decca F13825. *The Nolan Sisters - ''Harry, My Honolulu Lover'': Epic SEPC7197. *Kim Clark - ''Fantasy'': CBS SCBS7196. Only the winning song reached the UK singles chart.

At Eurovision

Black Lace were the winners of A Song for Europe with " Mary Ann" and went on to place 7th at the 1979 Eurovision Song Contest in

Jerusalem Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...

. This was also the only Eurovision between

1972 Within the context of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) it was the longest year ever, as two leap seconds were added during this 366-day year, an event which has not since been repeated. (If its start and end are defined using mean solar tim ...

and

2008 File:2008 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Lehman Brothers went bankrupt following the Subprime mortgage crisis; Cyclone Nargis killed more than 138,000 in Myanmar; A scene from the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing; ...

in which

did not provide either the television or radio commentary. Wogan had originally been scheduled to provide the television commentary but opted out of going to Israel following comments he made of the 1978 winner ''"

A-Ba-Ni-Bi "A-Ba-Ni-Bi" ( he, label=Hebrew script, א-ב-ני-בי; bet-language language game for the word ''aní'', meaning "I" in Hebrew) was the winning song in the Eurovision Song Contest 1978, performed for by Izhar Cohen and Alphabeta. Descripti ...

"'' sounding like ''"I Wanna Be a Polar Bear"''. Instead his Radio 2 colleague John Dunn provided the television commentary. Ray Moore provided the radio commentary on both

BBC Radio 1 BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It specialises in modern popular music and current chart hits throughout the day. The station provides alternative genres at night, including electronica, dance, ...

and Radio 2.

Voting

References

External links

UK National Final 1979
{{Eurovision Song Contest 1979

1979 Events January * January 1 ** United Nations Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim heralds the start of the '' International Year of the Child''. Many musicians donate to the '' Music for UNICEF Concert'' fund, among them ABBA, who write the so ...

Countries in the Eurovision Song Contest 1979 Eurovision Eurovision