Eurovision Song Contest 1957

Großer Sendesaal des hessischen Rundfunks, Frankfurt am Main - venue of the 1957 contest.

The contest took place in Frankfurt, one of the largest cities in, at the time, West Germany. The host venue was the Großer Sendesaal des Hessischen Rundfunks, a building, music hall and former television studio based in Frankfurt am Main. Today it is used as a music hall.[2][3]

After being devastated in the Second World War during the early 1940s, Frankfurt rebuilt itself well into the 1950s into one of Europe's most prominent financial centres. With investments coming in from both national and international financial institutions, 1957, the year of the contest, already saw the first of Frankfurt's high-rise business buildings.[4][5]

For some time, a rumour had existed that the privilege of hosting the 1957 contest was given to Germany because they had come in second place in 1956 with "Im Wartesaal zum großen Glück" by Walter Andreas Schwarz. In fact, not only were the official 1956 scores withheld, but the rule stating that the winning nation hosts the next year's Eurovision Song Contest had not yet been conceived. It was planned at the time that each participating country would take it in turns to host the event. However, as more and more countries wished to participate, this became impractical.[1]

The format of the contest was changed this year; each country sent one song to compete in the contest, unlike the previous edition with 2 songs per entry. Furthermore, each country sent 10 juries, who each distributed 10 points among their favorite songs. A new rule was introduced meaning juries were no longer allowed to vote for the song from their own country, a rule which would be continued throughout the contest's subsequent history.[1] This was also the first time that juries were contacted by telephone, being called by host Anaid to give out their votes after all the competing songs had performed.

Another new rule meant that duos were now allowed to compete. Danish representatives, Birthe Wilke and Gustav Winckler, were the first of such acts to participate under this new rule. At the end of their performance, the couple exchanged the longest kiss in the contest's history, sparking outcry from more conservative countries, although only people with televisions could actually see it. This was due to a member of the production staff forgetting to give a pre-arranged sign that the kiss should end.[1]

In this year's contest the Italian entry lasted for 5:09 minutes, whilst the UK's entry only lasted for 1:52 minutes. It was because of songs like the former that a rule was introduced the next year restricting each song to a maximum of 3 minutes; this rule still applies to this day.[1]

Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, and Switzerland made their second appearances following their débuts in 1956. Austria, Denmark and the UK competed for the first time; Austria and Denmark had wanted to participate in 1956, but had applied to the European Broadcasting Union after the deadline for song submissions for that year's contest had passed, thus missing it. With those joining in 1957, the total number of countries was ten, three more than in the first contest.[1]

It was thought that the United Kingdom had also missed the participation deadline for the 1956 contest, but the EBU revealed in January 2017 that this was unfounded speculation spread by fans of the contest.[6] The EBU further went on to explain that the Festival of British Popular Song, a contest created by the BBC for the United Kingdom, was the inspiration that brought in changes to the contest format.[6]

Returning artists

Bold indicates a previous winner

Artist	Country	Previous year(s)
Corry Brokken	Netherlands	1956
Lys Assia	Switzerland	1956

Results

Draw	Country	Artist	Song	Language[9][10]	Place[11]	Points
01	Belgium	Bobbejaan Schoepen	"Straatdeuntje"	Dutch	8	5
02	Luxembourg	Danièle Dupré	"Amours mortes (tant de peine)"	French	4	8
03	United Kingdom	Patricia Bredin	"All"	English	7	6
04	Italy	Nunzio Gallo	"Corde della mia chitarra"	Italian	6	7
05	Austria	Bob Martin	"Wohin, kleines Pony?"	German	10	3
06	Netherlands	Corry Brokken	"Net als toen"	Dutch	1	31
07	Germany	Margot Hielscher	"Telefon, Telefon"	German[lower-alpha 1]	4	8
08	France	Paule Desjardins	"La belle amour"	French	2	17
09	Denmark	Birthe Wilke and Gustav Winckler	"Skibet skal sejle i nat"	Danish	3	10
10	Switzerland	Lys Assia	"L'enfant que j'étais"	French	8	5

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

Broadcasters and commentators in participating countries

Country	Broadcaster(s)	Commentator(s)	Ref(s)
Austria	ORF	No commentator
Belgium	INR	French: Janine Lambotte
	NIR	Dutch: Nic Bal
Denmark	Statsradiofonien TV	Gunnar Hansen
France	RTF	Robert Beauvais
Germany	Deutsches Fernsehen	Wolf Mittler
Italy	Programma Nazionale	Bianca Maria Piccinino
Luxembourg	Télé-Luxembourg	Jacques Navadic
Netherlands	NTS	Piet te Nuyl
Switzerland	TSR	Georges Hardy
United Kingdom	BBC Television Service	Berkeley Smith	[8]
	BBC Light Programme	Tom Sloan

Broadcasters and commentators in non-participating countries

Country	Broadcaster(s)	Commentator(s)	Ref(s)
Sweden	Sveriges TV	Nils Linnman	[14]

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