The Eurovision Song Contest 1968 was the 13th edition of the

Eurovision Song Contest The Eurovision Song Contest (), often known simply as Eurovision, is an international Music competition, song competition organised annually by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) among its members since 1956. Each participating broadcaster ...

. It took place in

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

, United Kingdom, following the country's first victory at the with the song " Puppet on a String" by

Sandie Shaw Sandra Ann Goodrich (born 26 February 1947), known by her stage name Sandie Shaw, is a retired English pop singer. One of the most successful British female singers of the 1960s, she had three UK number one singles with "(There's) Always Some ...

. Despite having won for the first time the year before, it was actually the third time that the United Kingdom had hosted the competition, having previously done so in and , both of which also took place in London. Organised by the

European Broadcasting Union The European Broadcasting Union (EBU; , UER) is an alliance of Public broadcasting, public service media organisations in countries within the European Broadcasting Area (EBA) or who are member states of the Council of Europe, members of the ...

(EBU) and host broadcaster

British Broadcasting Corporation The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public broadcasting, public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved in ...

(BBC), the contest was held at

Royal Albert Hall The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall on the northern edge of South Kensington, London, England. It has a seating capacity of 5,272. Since the hall's opening by Queen Victoria in 1871, the world's leading artists from many performance genres ...

on 6 April 1968, and was hosted by

Katie Boyle Caterina Irene Elena Maria Boyle, Lady Saunders (; 29 May 1926 – 20 March 2018), usually known as Katie Boyle, was an Italian-born British actress, writer, radio announcer and television personality. She became best known for presenting the E ...

for the third time. It was notably also the first time that the contest was broadcast in colour. Seventeen countries participated in the contest, the same countries that had participated the previous year. The winner was with the song " La La La" by

Massiel María de los Ángeles Felisa Santamaría Espinosa (born 2 August 1947), known professionally as Massiel (), is a Spanish pop and protest singer. She won the Eurovision Song Contest 1968 with the song " La, la, la", being the first performer ...

, and written/composed by Manuel de la Calva and Ramón Arcusa. This was Spain's first victory - and their first ever top five placing - in the contest.

Location

The contest was held at the

. The Royal Albert Hall is known for hosting the world's leading artists from several performance genres, sports, award ceremonies, the annual summer Proms concerts and other events since its opening in 1871, and has become one of the United Kingdom's most treasured and distinctive buildings. At the time of the contest in 1968, the hall had a capacity of 7,000 seats.

Participants

All countries that had participated in 1967 also participated in 1968. The contest featured one representative who had previously performed as lead artists for the same country.

Isabelle Aubret Isabelle Aubret (; born Thérèse Coquerelle; 27 July 1938) is a French singer best known for winning the Eurovision Song Contest in 1962 with the song " Un premier amour". Early life Thérèse Coquerelle was born in Lille, France, on 27 Jul ...

had won Eurovision for . Originally Spanish broadcaster (TVE) entered

Joan Manuel Serrat Joan Manuel Serrat Teresa (; born 27 December 1943) is a Spanish musician, singer, and composer. He is considered one of the most important figures of modern, popular music in both Spanish and Catalan languages. Serrat's lyrical style has b ...

to sing "La La La", but his demand to sing in Catalan was an affront to the Francoist State dictatorship. Therefore, Massiel, who was on tour in

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

, was brought in as a late replacement. In just two weeks, she had to rush back to Spain, learn the song, record it in several languages, travel to Paris to get a dress and go to London for rehearsals. She sang the song in the contest in

Castilian Spanish In English, Castilian Spanish can mean the variety of Peninsular Spanish spoken in northern and central Spain, the standard form of Spanish, or Spanish from Spain in general. In Spanish, the term (Castilian) can either refer to the Spanish langu ...

with the new arrangement made to fit her. In her winning reprise, she performed part of her song in English, in addition to the original version, becoming the first winner to do so. The Norwegian national selection,

Melodi Grand Prix Melodi Grand Prix (), commonly known as Grand Prix and MGP, sometimes as Norsk Melodi Grand Prix, is an annual music competition organised by Norwegian public broadcaster (NRK). It determines for the Eurovision Song Contest, and has been sta ...

, ended with

Kirsti Sparboe Kirsti Sparboe (born 7 December 1946) is a Norwegian musical performer and an actress. Most of her musical career has been built on participation in the widely-popular Eurovision Song Contest in which she competed three times and scored a gran ...

and

Odd Børre Odd Børre Sørensen (9 August 1939 – 28 January 2023) was a Norwegian pop singer. Internationally, he is best known for the song "Stress (Odd Børre song), Stress" that he performed in the Eurovision Song Contest of 1968. He sang in the Kjell ...

winning with the song "". However the composer,

Kari Diesen Kari Diesen (née Heide-Steen; 24 June 1914 – 18 March 1987) was a Norwegian singer and revue actress. She worked for the revue theatre Chat Noir from 1937 to 1953, and for the Edderkoppen Theatre from 1954 to 1959. She participated in 24 ...

withdrew the song due to receiving multiple accusations of plagiarism of the song "

Summer Holiday Summer holiday may refer to: * Summer vacation The term summer vacation or summer break refers to a school break in the summer between school years and the break in the school academic year. Students are off anywhere between two weeks to thre ...

" by

Cliff Richard Sir Cliff Richard (born Harry Rodger Webb; 14 October 1940) is a British singer and actor. He has total sales of over 21.5 million singles in the United Kingdom and, as of 2012, was the third-top-selling artist in UK Singles Chart histo ...

. The runner-up song in the selection, "Stress" would perform in the contest instead, where

was chosen to be the singer.

Format

1968 was the first time that the Eurovision Song Contest was broadcast in colour. The countries that broadcast it in colour were France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, Sweden and the United Kingdom, although in the UK it was broadcast as an encore presentation in colour on

BBC Two BBC Two is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's second flagship channel, and it covers a wide range of subject matte ...

the next day. Many Eastern European countries as well as Tunisia broadcast the contest. Prior to the contest, the bookmakers were sure of another British victory, as the English singer

, who was already dominating the music charts at that time, was hotly tipped as the favourite to win, but in the end he lost out to Spain's song by a margin of just one vote.

Contest overview

Spokespersons

Each participating broadcaster appointed a spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for its respective country via telephone. Known spokespersons at the 1968 contest are listed below. * * *

Michael Aspel Michael Terence Aspel (born 12 January 1933) is an English retired television presenter and newsreader. He hosted programmes such as '' Crackerjack!'', '' Ask Aspel'', ''Aspel & Company'', '' Give Us a Clue'', '' This Is Your Life'', '' Strange ...

Detailed voting results

Due to a misunderstanding by the hostess, Katie Boyle, Switzerland were erroneously awarded 3 votes by Yugoslavia, instead of 2. The scrutineer asked for the Yugoslav votes from TV Skopje to be announced a second time.

Broadcasts

Each participating broadcaster was required to relay the contest via its networks. Non-participating EBU member broadcasters were also able to relay the contest as "passive participants". Broadcasters were able to send commentators to provide coverage of the contest in their own native language and to relay information about the artists and songs to their television viewers. In addition to the participating countries, the contest was also reportedly broadcast in Tunisia, and in Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania and the Soviet Union via Intervision, with an estimated global audience of between 150 and 200 million. Known details on the broadcasts in each country, including the specific broadcasting stations and commentators are shown in the tables below.

Notes

References

External links

* {{Coord, 51, 30, 03.40, N, 00, 10, 38.77, W, type:landmark_scale:3000, display=title

1968 Events January–February * January 1968, January – The I'm Backing Britain, I'm Backing Britain campaign starts spontaneously. * January 5 – Prague Spring: Alexander Dubček is chosen as leader of the Communist Party of Cze ...

Music festivals in the United Kingdom 1968 in music 1968 in London April 1968 in the United Kingdom Events at the Royal Albert Hall Francoist Spain