Eurovision Song Contest 1978


The Eurovision Song Contest 1978 was the 23rd edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. It was held on 22 April 1978 in Paris. The contest was won by Izhar Cohen & the Alphabeta who represented Israel with the song "A-Ba-Ni-Bi". Although 'A-Ba-Ni-Bi' is the correct title, French television mistakenly captioned on screen the song title as 'Ah-Bah-Nee-Bee'. The presenters were Denise Fabre and Léon Zitrone, and this was the first time more than one presenter hosted an edition of the Contest and the first to have a male presenter since 1956. In addition, the two presenters served as commentators for France. Twenty countries participated, a record at the time.
The winning entry was a love song sung in the Hebrew equivalent of Ubbi dubbi. This was Israel's first Eurovision win, which was also the first winning song to be performed in one of the Semitic languages. The win caused problems for several North African and Middle-Eastern nations that were televising the contest, even though they were not participating. According to author and political commentator John Kennedy O'Connor in his book The Eurovision Song Contest: The Official History, when Israel became the clear winners during the voting, most of the Arabic stations ended their transmission of the contest. Jordanian TV finished the show with a photo of a bunch of daffodils on screen, later announcing that the Belgian entry was the winner. Television of the USSR for the first time showed a competition, and until 1988 only performances of several participants, each time with the exception of representatives of Israel. Norway finished last for the fifth time, gaining the first nul points during the current voting system was implemented in 1975.

Location

The event took place in Paris, the capital and largest city of France, with the host venue being the Palais des congrès de Paris which is a concert venue, convention centre and shopping mall in the 17th arrondissement of Paris. The venue was built by French architect Guillaume Gillet, and was inaugurated in 1974.

Format

The postcards were filmed live, once they showed the entry of the artist. They took a corridor, then an elevator which led them behind the scenes of the scene. Then they greeted the previous participants and made their entrance. The camera also made several shots of the audience, notably Jane Birkin and Serge Gainsbourg.
Björn Skifs was unhappy with the rule that every country would have to perform in their native language. He planned to sing in English anyway, but changed his mind at the very last moment, causing him to completely forget the lyrics. He therefore sang the first few lines in gibberish before finding the words again. Along with the 20 participating countries, the show was also broadcast live in Yugoslavia, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Jordan, East Germany, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Dubai, Hong Kong, the Soviet Union and Japan.

Participating countries

returned to the competition after eleven years of absence, while Turkey did so after missing out one year.

Conductors

Each performance had a conductor who conducted the orchestra.
Several artists returned to the 1978 Contest. Ireen Sheer had previously represented Luxembourg in 1974, and finished in equal fourth place. Jean Vallée also returned, eight years after representing Belgium in 1970, while Norbert Niedermeyer, who had represented Austria in 1972 as part of the band The Milestones, was back as a member of the Austrian band Springtime.

Results

Notes:

Scoreboard

12 points

Below is a summary of all 12 points in the final:
N.ContestantVoting nation
6IsraelBelgium, Germany, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Switzerland, Turkey
5BelgiumFrance, Greece, Ireland, Monaco, United Kingdom
3LuxembourgItaly, Portugal, Spain
1FranceAustria
1GermanyFinland
1IrelandNorway
1MonacoSweden
1NetherlandsIsrael
1SpainDenmark

International broadcasts and voting

Spokespersons

The table below shows the order in which votes were cast during the 1978 contest along with the spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for their respective country. Each country had a jury who awarded 12, 10, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 points for their top ten songs.
  1. – John Skehan
  2. – Egil Teige
  3. – Mariolina Cannuli
  4. – Kaarina Pönniö
  5. – Isabel Wolmar
  6. - Marc Menant
  7. – Matías Prats
  8. – Colin Berry
  9. – Michel Stocker
  10. – André Hagon
  11. – Dick van Bommel
  12. – Meral Savcı
  13. – Ute Verhoolen
  14. – Carole Chabrier
  15. – Niki Venega
  16. – Jens Dreyer
  17. – Jacques Harvey
  18. – Yitzhak Shim'oni
  19. – Jenny Pippal
  20. – Sven Lindahl

    Television

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

Participating countries

Some participating countries did not provide radio broadcasts for the event; the ones who did are listed below.