Eurovision Song Contest 1982


The Eurovision Song Contest 1982 was the 27th edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. It was held on 24 April 1982 in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, United Kingdom. The presenter was Jan Leeming.
The German entrant, Nicole, was the winner with the song "Ein bißchen Frieden". Germany received 1.61 times as many points as runner-up Israel, which was a record under the current scoring system until 2009, when Norway received 1.78 times as many points as Iceland. The song also cemented Ralph Siegel and Bernd Meinunger, the song's composers, into German Eurovision tradition, writing 18 Eurovision songs between them before and after "Ein bißchen Frieden", 13 of which were for Germany.
This was the first time that Germany won the contest. They had competed in the finals every year since the contest's inception.

Location

is a spa town in North Yorkshire, England. Historically in the West Riding of Yorkshire, the town is a tourist destination and its visitor attractions include its spa waters and RHS Harlow Carr gardens. Nearby is the Yorkshire Dales national park and the Nidderdale AONB. Harrogate grew out of two smaller settlements, High Harrogate and Low Harrogate, in the 17th century. The town became known as 'The English Spa' in the Georgian Era, after its waters were discovered in the 16th century. In the 17th and 18th centuries its 'chalybeate' waters were a popular health treatment, and the influx of wealthy but sickly visitors contributed significantly to the wealth of the town.
The Harrogate International Centre was chosen as the host venue for the contest. The grand convention and exhibition centre opened short time prior to the contest, and was the first big event held in the main 2000-seat auditorium.

Contest overview

The opening of the contest showed a map of Europe, with the translation "Where is Harrogate?" popping up on-screen from the languages of the various countries. The question was always in the language in which the respective country's song was performed, with the exception of Ireland. The Irish entry was sung in English, but the translation of the question in the map was in Irish. Then the map zoomed into Harrogate's location in Yorkshire, followed by an introduction video spotlighting the town.
Greece was due to participate in the contest with the song "Sarantapente Kopelies" performed by Themis Adamantidis. Although drawn to perform in second place, ERT withdrew the entry a few weeks before the contest.
In November 1981, France's national broadcaster, TF1, declined to enter the Eurovision Song Contest for 1982, with the head of entertainment, Pierre Bouteiller, saying, "The absence of talent and the mediocrity of the songs were annoyance set in. a monument to inanity ." Antenne 2 became the new broadcaster for Eurovision after public outcry, returning the country to the Contest in 1983.
The tradition of previous year's winners handing over the prize to current winners was not followed by Bucks Fizz, winners in 1981.
Irish band Chips lost out in their national finals, which, had they been successful, would have led to the unique situation of two bands in the same Eurovision with the same name.
This year, before the postcard of a specific country, the camera would zoom into the commentary box of that country's broadcaster, where the commentator/s would give a hand gesture, e.g. wave. The postcard would start with the country's flag on the screen and an excerpt of the country's national anthem.

Conductors

There were 18 competitors in this year's final. No year since has had this few competitors in the final of the competition.
DrawCountryArtistSongLanguagePlacePoints
01Doce"Bem bom"Portuguese1332
02Svetlana"Cours après le temps"French678
03Jahn Teigen & Anita Skorgan"Adieu"Norwegian1240
04Bardo"One Step Further"English776
05Neco"Hani?"Turkish1520
06Kojo"Nuku pommiin"Finnish180
07Arlette Zola"Amour on t'aime"French397
08Anna Vissi"Mono i agapi" Greek585
09Chips"Dag efter dag"Swedish867
10Mess"Sonntag"German957
11Stella"Si tu aimes ma musique"French496
12Lucía"Él"Spanish1052
13Brixx"Video, Video"Danish175
14Aska"Halo, halo" Serbo-Croatian1421
15Avi Toledano"Hora" Hebrew2100
16Bill van Dijk"Jij en ik"Dutch168
17The Duskeys"Here Today Gone Tomorrow"English1149
18Nicole"Ein bißchen Frieden"German1161

Voting structure

Each country had a jury who awarded 12, 10, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 point for their top ten songs.
Germany had the advantage of performing last. After coming second in 1980 and second in Dublin the year previously, Ralph Siegel and Bernd Meinunger took the first Grand Prix for Germany. The winner, Nicole, beat the nearest competition by 61 points and over 13 million West Germans watched her victory on television. Germany was the commanding leader for nearly the entire voting process.
Nicole went on to sing the reprise of her song in English, French and Dutch, as well as German, to the delight of the invited audience in Harrogate Conference Centre who stood to applaud her. The English version of her Eurovision winner, A Little Peace, subsequently shot to No. 1 in the UK Singles Chart.

Score sheet

12 points

Below is a summary of all 12 points in the final:
N.ContestantVoting nation
9GermanyCyprus, Denmark, Ireland, Israel, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, Yugoslavia
2CyprusNetherlands, Norway
2IsraelFinland, Germany
2SwitzerlandBelgium, United Kingdom
2United KingdomAustria, Luxembourg
1YugoslaviaSweden

Returning artists

Commentators

Television

Participating countries

Participating countries

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