Eurovision 1994: Dublin

Ireland hosted for the second year running, something no country had done before, and brought the contest back to Dublin: to the Point Theatre, an old railway depot in the docklands, with about 3,200 seats. Cynthia Ní Mhurchú and Gerry Ryan presented.

The evening is remembered for three things, and the song that won is the least of them.

Out with seven, in with seven

This was the first contest with relegation. The seven countries with the lowest scores in 1993 lost their places, to make room for seven that had never taken part.

The newcomers were Estonia, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Russia and Slovakia. Nothing like it had happened since 1956: the contest had never taken in so many new countries at once.

Belgium was one of those sent down, and so missed a contest for the first time. That left only Germany and Switzerland with an unbroken record.

Italy then withdrew of its own accord — from lack of public interest, it was thought, and from worry about the cost of hosting if it won. Its place went to Cyprus, the best of the relegated seven.

Poland’s rehearsal

The final dress rehearsal on the afternoon of the show is not just a rehearsal. The juries listen to it.

In that rehearsal Poland’s Edyta Górniak sang the second half of her song in English. The rules said entries must be sung in a national language, and the juries had now heard something else.

There were talks about punishing Poland, even about disqualifying it. In the end it was allowed to stay.

Riverdance

The theme of the show was rivers: the theatre stands on the Liffey, and the set was a futuristic Dublin by night with the river glowing under the floor.

The interval act carried the theme on. It was a seven-minute piece by the composer Bill Whelan, who had written the interval music for Dublin’s 1981 contest. It had the orchestra, a choir, and a line of Irish dancers led by two Irish-Americans, Jean Butler and Michael Flatley. It was called “Riverdance”.

No interval act has had an afterlife like it. The music was released as a single and went straight to number one in Ireland, where it stayed for eighteen weeks. Within months the seven minutes were being built into a full stage show, which went round the world.

The result

Ireland won for the third year in a row. No country had ever done that. It was also Ireland’s sixth victory, which was a record on its own.

The song was “Rock ‘n’ Roll Kids”, written by Brendan Graham and performed by Paul Harrington and Charlie McGettigan without the orchestra — the first winner to do without it. It scored 226 points, the first time any song had passed 200.

Poland, rehearsal and all, was second with 166 — the best result any country had managed on its debut. Hungary was fourth and Russia ninth.

The other four newcomers found out how hard it could be. All finished in the bottom seven, and Lithuania’s first entry did not score a point.