Eurovision Song Contest

[Dave]

Follow-up from the Classic FM Most Wanted thread:

gareth said:

PS In my turn, I have obtained some original material of the European Song Festival Contest, including the 1958 winning entry from Italy (Volare!), Cliff Richard's "Congratulations" from 1968 (it came 2nd), and two other personal favorites of mine, "Eres Tu" from the Spanish group Mocedades (2nd in 1973, when Cliff came in 3rd with "Power to all our friends") and Nicole from Germany (1982), perfroming "Ein bisschen Frieden" (This song won by the largest margin ever in the history of the Eurovison Song Festival Contest.)

I haven't digitised these (I have them on VCR) but if people are interested ...
Gerrit

Well, that depends! It's a long shot but if by any chance you have a video of Gigliola Cinquetti's winning song in the 1964 Eurovision contest, I'd move mountains to persuade you to part with a copy! The song is "Non Ho L'Eta' Per Amarti" and I have the original single, on vinyl i.postimg.cc/9fYxy370/smilie-big-grin.gif but no video of it [/i]

But - I am compelled to take issue with you regarding the song with the "largest margin ever in the history of the Eurovision Contest". In a way, the statement is correct - but it is misleading!

Nicole received 161 points and the 2nd placed song had 100 points and yes, 61 points (61% more than the 2nd song) may be the largest ever winning *points* margin (but I haven't checked every year). The total points awarded that year, with 18 participating Countries, was 1012.

However, in 1964, Gigliola Cinquetti received 49 points - and the 2nd placed song by Matt Monro - I Love the Little Things (anyone else remember that one?) had a mere 17 points. Gigliola's winning margin was 32 points but the total points awarded that year, with 16 participating Countries, was only... 144. The points system was dramatically changed before 1982 - and Gigliola scored 188% more than the 2nd place song.

Now, we can compare the two results in more detail.

If we raise Matt Monro's 1964 2nd place score of 17 points to 100 (to match the 1982 2nd place song), Gigliola would have received... 288 points

If we raise Gigliola's 1964 points score in the same same proportion as the total votes cast by all Countries (1964, 144: 1982, 1012), her total becomes a massive 344 points

Nicole received 15.9% of the total votes cast.
Gigliola received 30.0% of the total votes cast.

I think it is now clear who really won by the biggest margin in the history of the Eurovision Contest (some time ago, I checked the scores for every year!) I would hazard a guess that "my" Gigliola's winning margin in percentage terms will never, ever ever be matched or beaten.

I hope nobody out there can prove me wrong - there's now an official book covering the history of the Contest (I must get a copy, quick!)

Cheers, Dave

[gareth]

Hi Dave,

They didn't show anything of Gigliola Cinquetti - so alas. In fact there were 14 nominations for best Eurovision Song Contest song, based on a previous Internet vote - and, I am led to believe, impact of the song. So Cliff Richard's Congratulations (which came second in 1968) was one of the nominations, while the number 1 from that year didn't make it - and the same with Eres Tu from Mocedades in 1973 - although it came second that year, it proved a much bigger hit.

You can use statistics to say anything, but, with more points to be divided, and more countries participating, it becomes much more difficult to achieve the proportional difference that Gigliola achieved. With 16 countries totalling 144 points, each country could only award a total of 8 points - very likely the number 1 in a country would receive 4 points (or 50% of the total) ....

Currently, countries get 58 points to divide each - with 12 points to the winner (or just over 20%). It's even impossible for anyone now to achieve the 344 points mentioned. There are 25 countries participating, and you are not allowed to vote for your own country. So the maximum anyone get get now is 24 x 12 points = 288 points - and even then, the winner must get first place in every of those 24 countries. Highly improbable.

If you want to make a realistic comparison, you should lit the percentage of first places, second places etc. the singers received - clearly the proportional differnce between points for first place and points for second place were in 1964 much higher than in 1982.

You are right Dave, Gigliola's relative winning margin will never be matched - the scoring rules today won't permit that.

Gerrit

[Dave]

Hi Gerrit!

What a pity about the method used to choose the songs to be voted for in that poll. Many people's memories have faded (or gone altogether!!!) since the 1950s and 1960s. And I wonder if the poll has a built in bias in favour of particular Countries?

Point taken, about the stats. That's why I compared more than one measure of the winning margin but yes, I really need to compare how many Countries voted them into 1st, 2nd, 3rd places I guess. So here it is:

Gigliola (16 Countries participated - 15 could vote, but only for 3 Countries)

1st - 8 Countries (50.0%)
2nd - 3 Countries (18.7%)
3rd - 0 Countries (0.0%)
other-5 Countries (31.3%)

Only the first three choices were given points.

Nicole (18 Countries participated - 17 could vote, but only for 10 Countries)

1st - 9 Countries (50.0%)
2nd - 3 Countries (16.7%)
3rd - 2 Countries (11.1%)
other - 4 Countries (22.2%)

Wow, that IS close! As you say, it all depends on how you present the statistics. So, first place is a tie in percentage terms; if you then use 2nd place to break the tie (which is a common method in competition), Gigliola scrapes home by a whisker. But if you take third place into account and weight the percentages, Nicole might scrape home in front(depending on the weighting applied to 1st, 2nd and 3rd).

But I may have been too generous to Nicole. If you disregard the "home" Country - which in both cases is ineligible to vote for itself - the maximum possible number of voting Countries drops by one. For Gigliola it drops to 15; for Nicole it drops to 17. The comparison table then looks as follows:

Gigliola (15 Countries voted, each for 3 others)

1st - 8 Countries (53.3%)
2nd - 3 Countries (20.0%)
3rd - 0 Countries (0.0%)
other-4 Countries (26.7%)

Nicole (17 Countries voted, each for 10 others)

1st - 9 Countries (52.9%)
2nd - 3 Countries (17.6%)
3rd - 2 Countries (11.8%)
other-3 Countries (17.7%)

I think most people would agree that by this measure, Gigliola clearly edges ahead of Nicole, even if you count down to 2nd place. Only if you take it down to the minor placings (3rd and below) could it be argued that
Nicole had the better result and even that very much depends on what weightings are allocated to each position.

If my calculations are correct, would you agree that it is misleading to say (and I don't want to imply that you are the one who said it because I've heard it before!) that Nicole had the biggest ever points victory in the history of the Eurovision Song Contest - without qualifying it with a mention of Gigliola's win?

Of course, you won't be surprised to know that I would say: "the biggest win" was by... Gigliola in 1964! It's tragic that she doesn't get a mention in that poll because at the time, she had a tremendous impact all over Europe. I wish I'd known about it!

Cheers, Dave

PS If you'd like a copy of the spreadsheet containing all this "useless information" let me know i.postimg.cc/9fYxy370/smilie-big-grin.gif

[roger]

Haha! Haven't you guys got anything better to do?

The Eurovision Song Contest is a joke. The scoring is laughingly political and therefore highly predictable. A very high proportion of the artists are, to say the least, mediochre, and the quality of many of the songs does not deserve air time. Oh, one other thing.....

It's brilliant and I absolutely love it to bits!

Alas, I don't remember Gigliola - I'm too young! Lol The first contest I saw was when Sandy Shaw won with 'Puppet On A String'. If memory serves me correctly, that was in 1966(?). Since then, I believe I have only missed seeing it once. On the relevant evening every May, I am there glued to the television for the latest thrilling instalment.

Oh yes, I certainly remember 'Eres Tu' which is probably my favourite song ever to have come from the ESC. Another favourite is undoubtedly Nicole's entry which was really lovely. Remind me, gentlemen. When the winning entry is reprised at the end, wasn't Nicole the first to sing one verse in four or five different languages? If I remember rightly, that proved highly popular.

For me, there was one other entry that I thought was a beautiful song and very well performed. Unfortunately I cannot remember the singer or the title of the song even though it was in this year's contest. It was the entry from Malta which came in 2nd. Anyone remember it?

Huh, and nobody has yet mentioned Abba!.....

Altogether now....
Waterloo, how would it be if we won the war.....

Roger

[gareth]

Actually, I made one calcaulation error in my previous post, with 16 countries netting 144 points, each country has 9 points to share out, and with the information you gave about Gigliola, I deduce that first place at that time netted 5 points, 2nd place 3 points and 3rd place 1 point. In 2005 that was 12 -10- 8

It would appear to me that the best thing we could do is to apply the 1964 formula to Nicole's results. She would then have received 9x5 +3x3 + 2x1 = 56 points, from a maximum of 18x9 = 162 points, or 34.57% of the maximum. Gigliola received 49 points from a maximum of 144 points, which is 34.03% of the maximum. If we leave out the home country, which was ineligible to vote, Nicole received 56 points from 153 (36.60%) and Gigliola received 49 points from 135 (36.29%). That's too close to call.

The only two conclusions I can draw are:

i) The countries that put Gigliola in the top 3, put her on average a bit higher (no 3rd places!)
ii) A higher proportion put Nicole in the top 3 (only 3 out of 17 did not, whereas 4 out of 15 did not have Gigliola in the top 3)

However, the 3 countries that did not have Nicole in the top 3, gave her very few points (only 7 in total). So I think it really comes down to where the other 4 countries put Gigliola. Chances are she could then well scrape ahead of Nicole .... So, I come to a different conclusion than you, Dave. You say that the minor placings (3rd and lower ) - might give Nicole the better result. I think there's every chance those minor placings might end up giving Gigliola the better result - if today's rules had been applied.

So, I come to the interesting conclusion that, applying the 1964 scoring rule to 1982, Nicole scores the better total (by a whisker) - but, applying the 1982 scoring rule to 1964, Gigliola might well score the better total (by a whisker) It only depends - if the 4 countries that didn't put Gigliola in the top 3 have her at 4th place, she'll win. I they have her in last place, she'll lose ....

By all means, send me the spreadsheet with that 'useless' information - I find this sort of number crunching relaxing .

By the way, Dave, I realise that many of these contests tend to favour the more recent occurences. Yet, I think this contest was a pleasurable exception. They were trying to find the 'best'/'most popular' Eurovision Song Contest song in the 50 year history of this contest.

Now, the 1958 song 'Volare' came in second (apparently this song has been covered by more artists than any other ESC song!) And Johnny Logan's 1987 entry (I forget it's title now), was voted 3rd. Not exactly the most recent ones, are they?

========

Oh, and no, Roger, I have nothing better to do. The alternative would be to update Katherine-Jenkins-International (an eligible artist for the ESC); or Holly-Holyoake-International (an eligible artist for the ESC); or Hayley-Westenra-International.net (not eligible -although ... it has been acknowledged Westenra is a Dutch name - we might be willing to slip her in on that basis); or Yulia-Townsend-International (eligible -? - she has been naturalised to a New-Zealander, but she was Russian - and judging by Russian achievements, they can do with a class performer .....)

OK, OK, so what was the number one ESC song of the last 50 years?

Roger, you mentioned it!

Waterloo.....

Now, I didn't bother to record that song - I don't dislike it, but I myself have no intention of promoting a group like ABBA ....

Not quite my style ....

Then again, out of 50 years of ESC, numbers one and two came from the first 20 years ...

[Dave]

Hehe, I'm willing to call it a dead heat.. probably Shall we call it quits?

What is certain is that these two singers are almost certainly head and shoulders above the rest in ESC voting terms and they cannot really be separated statistically. But I cannot stand by and let Gigliola be forgotten, as she so often is when the history of the ESC comes up. She's had a long and successful recording career in Italy... she was born less than 6 months after me... and she was fab!

What is often forgotten is that:

Gigliola returned to ESC duty in 1974 with "Si" and nearly won...

but there, she met her Waterloo!

1) 24 points - Abba
2) 18 points - Gigliola

Funnily enough, even though I loved "Si", I knew the instant I heard Waterloo that it would win - and that Abba would take over the World Poor girl, she would have won again in most other years - and if she had, she would have been the first singer to win it twice.

"Si" (Go - Before You Break My Heart) is widely thought to have been the best song in the ESC that year - but Abba had the more exciting act... and I'm almost glad they won!

Dave

[Richard]

Hello Dave, Roger and Gerrit!

I used to watch the Eurovision Song Contest, but I lost interest after Sandie Shaw won it in 1967 with "Puppet On A String". I thought it was the worst song I'd ever heard, and I still think that now!

Actually I did watch it for a few more years because I remember the ludicrous four-way tie in 1969. It included "Boom Bang A Bang" sung by Lulu, but I reckon it should have been sung by Basil Brush! On second thoughts, he should have been in it in 1967 singing "Puppet On A Hand"! i.postimg.cc/9fYxy370/smilie-big-grin.gif

I used to quite like ABBA, but whoever wrote "Waterloo" had ideas above his station!

OK, I'm going...

Richard

[gareth]

Hehe Richard,

Waterloo Station is where I arrived in London on Sep 22, in time for that special concert somewhere near Piccadilly ....

Actually, that ludicrous four-way-tie, watch what you're saying. One of those four-ways came from Holland, if I remember correctly. I'm kinda sensitive about the Dutch doing well, you see. Even if it is in a double-double Dutch four-way tie .

[Richard]

Oops, sorry Gerrit!

What I really meant was, there should have been a system in place to sort out the four-way tie and produce a winner.

I'm now on 1,000 posts, so I think I'll celebrate by buying myself a four-figure poster bed! i.postimg.cc/9fYxy370/smilie-big-grin.gif

Best Wishes from London, near Waterloo Station!

Richard