Eurovision 1958: Hilversum

The 1958 contest is remembered for the song that came third. It should also be remembered as the night the broadcast broke during the first song, and as the year the winner-hosts-next-year tradition began — by accident.

How Hilversum got it

Winning in 1957 did not give the Netherlands the right to host. The arrangement at the time was that broadcasters would take turns, and the BBC was first in line. It gave the contest up after failing to reach an agreement with the artists’ unions. Other broadcasters were offered it and said no. The Dutch broadcaster NTS took it only once everyone else had declined.

So the previous year’s winner hosted, and it has worked that way, more or less, ever since.

The show came from the AVRO Studios in Hilversum on 12 March 1958 and ran for about an hour and ten minutes. Hannie Lips presented. The studio was dressed with thousands of tulips, and behind the singers were backdrops that changed for every song and slid away to reveal the scoreboard. Dolf van der Linden, who had conducted the Dutch winner in Frankfurt, was musical director with the Metropole Orkest.

Who was there

Ten countries again, but not the same ten. Sweden made its debut. The United Kingdom, listed as a participant in the rules sent out the previous November, did not turn up. Monaco had meant to enter and didn’t.

It was a year of familiar faces. Lys Assia sang for Switzerland for the third contest in a row, and Corry Brokken, the reigning champion, did the same for the Netherlands. Belgium’s Fud Leclerc was back from 1956 and Germany’s Margot Hielscher from 1957.

The rules were left alone, with one exception in practice: after Italy’s five-minute song the year before, the three-and-a-half-minute limit was enforced this time.

The fault

Italy was drawn to sing first. Domenico Modugno performed “Nel blu, dipinto di blu” — and in several countries the picture or the sound never arrived. A technical fault meant part of the audience had missed the opening song.

The answer was to let him do it again. After the tenth and last song, Modugno came back out and sang it a second time.

There was a second pause built into the evening, too: after the fifth song the orchestra played an instrumental interlude, to give the juries a moment to think.

The result

France won. André Claveau’s “Dors mon amour” took 27 of the 100 votes — the first of France’s five victories. Lys Assia nearly made it two wins in three years: Switzerland finished second with 24.

Italy, with two performances, was third on 13.

At the other end of the board, the host country had a bad night. Corry Brokken, defending champion and singing in her home studio, got one vote. The Netherlands shared last place with Luxembourg.

The song that came third

Almost nobody calls it “Nel blu, dipinto di blu”. As “Volare” it became one of the first Eurovision songs to matter outside Eurovision. It reached number one on the American Billboard Hot 100, went top five in Belgium, Canada, the Netherlands and Norway, and top ten in Britain. At the very first Grammy Awards, in May 1959, it was named both Record of the Year and Song of the Year.

When the contest held a fiftieth-anniversary show in 2005 to pick its favourite entry of all time, “Volare” was one of fourteen songs on the shortlist. It finished second, behind ABBA’s “Waterloo”.

The song that beat it in Hilversum is the one on the winner’s card above.