Intro Post

< 1957 Review | 1958 Review | 1959 Review >

Introduction

The third Eurovision Song Contest was originally going to be hosted in the United Kingdom, but since the BBC apparently failed to reach an agreement with artistic unions, the EBU had to find another broadcaster to host, and after other broaddcasters declined to host, the Netherlands’ NTS was given the hosting duties. As a nice coincidence, the Netherlands happened to be the winner of the last contest, so in all following years, the EBU gave the most recent winner the first choice of hosting. It’s good that the pattern of the previous winner hosting was established so early, because it gives countries an incentive to send competitive entries. The Netherlands chose to host the show in AVRO Studios in Hilversum. In the old days, it was common for the contest to be hosted in the headquarters of broadcasters.

The United Kingdom dropped out of Eurovision this year, while Sweden made its debut, meaning that Eurovision 1958 has ten entries just like last year. Out of these, the Italian entry became an enormous international hit that even charted in the United States and Canada, but for some reason it only scored third place behind Switzerland and the oft-forgotten winning entry from France.

One more odd fact about this contest: this is the only Eurovision year where the host doesn’t appear at the beginning. Instead, we see a camera shot of the scoreboard set to an orchestral opening act, while the commentators introduced the show. This is the first year of the contest where any country’s commentary has been archived, specifically the Dutch commentary. In fact, Eurovision 1958 has never been archived without commentary as far as I know. The Dutch commentator has very good diction and I find him relatively easy to understand, even though I can’t speak Dutch.

Update: A few weeks after this post, the French commentary of this contest has been archived! However, it starts in the midst of Italy’s entry.

After only a minute and a half, the opening entry begins! The orchestra was very much put front and center in this contest—they even have orchestral transitions between each of the competing entries, a detail I absolutely love.