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The Eurovision Song Contest 1973 was the eighteenth Eurovision Song Contest and was held in Luxembourg. It was won by the Luxembourg entry, "Tu te reconnaîtras", this being Luxembourg's fourth win. The voting was a very close one, with Spain finishing only 4 points behind and Cliff Richard of the United Kingdom (who came second in 1968) another 2 points after. According to The Eurovision Song Contest - The Official History by John Kennedy O'Connor, the winning song scored the highest score ever achieved in Eurovision under any voting format, recording 129 points out of a possible 160; scoring just under 81% of the possible maximum, but partly due to a scoring system which guaranteed all countries at least two points from each other country.[1]

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 [hide*1 Location

Location[edit][]

For more details on the host city, see Luxembourg (city).[1][2]Grand Théâtre de Luxembourg. Host venue of the 1973 Eurovision Song Contest.

The city of Luxembourg, also known as Luxembourg City, is a commune with city status, and thecapital of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. It is located at the confluence of the Alzette and PétrusseRivers in southern Luxembourg. The city contains the historic Luxembourg Castle, established by theFranks in the Early Middle Ages, around which a settlement developed.

The Grand Théâtre de Luxembourg, inaugurated in 1964 as the Théâtre Municipal de la Ville de Luxembourg, became the venue for the 1973 contest. It is the city's major venue for drama, opera and ballet.[2][3]

Format[edit][]

The language rule forcing countries to enter songs sung in any of their national languages was dropped, so performers from some countries sang inEnglish. The event was marked by controversy when the Spanish song, "Eres tú" (by Mocedades), was accused of plagiarism due to reasonable similarities in the melody with the Yugoslav entry from the 1966 contest ("Brez besed" sung by Berta Ambrož); however, "Eres tú" was not disqualified. After finishing second in the contest, the song went on to become a huge international hit.

The somewhat elliptical lyrics to Portugal's entry "Tourada" provided sufficient cover for a song that was clearly understood as a blistering assault on the country's decaying dictatorship. Also, the word "breasts" was used during Sweden's song entry. However, no action was taken by the EBU. An argument broke out between the singer Maxi and her Irish delegation over how the song should be performed. During rehearsals she repeatedly stopped performing in frustration. When it began to appear possible that Maxi might withdraw from the contest, RTÉ immediately sent over another singer, Tina Reynolds, to take her place just in case. In the end Miss Reynolds wasn't needed as Maxi did perform, with her entry earning 10th place on the scoreboard. (Reynolds would perform the following year.)

This contest holds the record for the most watched Eurovision Song Contest in the United Kingdom, and is also the 18th most watched television showin the same country, with an estimated 21.54 million tuning in on the night. Cliff Richard represented the UK with the song Power to All Our Friends. He came 3rd with 123 points. The winner though was Ann-Marie David with "Tu Te Reconnaitras". In the UK it was released in English under the title "Wonderful Dream" and released on Epic. It made number 13.

In the light of events at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, there were fears of a terrorist threat, particularly directed against Israel's first-ever entrant, leading to unusually tight security for the contest. This gave rise to one of the best-known Eurovision anecdotes, frequently recounted by the UK's long-serving commentator Terry Wogan. He recalled that the floor manager strongly advised the audience to remain seated while applauding the performances, otherwise they risked being shot by security forces.[4]

Participating countries[edit][]

Seventeen nations took part in this year's contest. Malta was drawn to perform in 6th place between Norway and Monaco, but the Maltese broadcaster withdrew before the deadline to select an entry.[5] The 1973 contest marked the first time that women conducted the ESC orchestra. Monica Dominiqueconducted the Swedish entry and Nurit Hirsh conducted the Israeli entry.

Conductors[edit][]

Each performance had a conductor who maestro the orchestra.[6]

Returning artists[edit][]

Three artists returned to the 1973 contest, Finland's Marion Rung, who last represented the nation in 19621971 entrant Massimo Ranieri from Italy; and Cliff Richard, who last performed "Congratulations" for the United Kingdom in 1968.

Results[edit][]

Draw Country Language[7] Artist Song English translation Place Points
01 Finland English Marion Rung "Tom Tom Tom" 6 93
02 Belgium Dutch1 Nicole & Hugo "Baby, Baby" 17 58
03 Portugal Portuguese Fernando Tordo "Tourada" Bullfight 10 80
04 Germany German Gitte "Junger Tag" Young day 8 85
05 Norway EnglishFrench2 Bendik Singers "It's Just A Game" 7 89
06 Monaco French Marie "Un train qui part" A train that leaves 8 85
07 Spain Spanish Mocedades "Eres tú" Are You 2 125
08   Switzerland French Patrick Juvet "Je vais me marier, Marie" I'm getting married, Marie 12 79
09 Yugoslavia Bosnian Zdravko Čolić "Gori vatra" The fire is burning 15 65
10 Italy Italian Massimo Ranieri "Chi sarà con te" Who will be with you 13 74
11  Luxembourg French Anne-Marie David "Tu te reconnaîtras" You will recognise yourself 1 129
12 Sweden English Nova and The Dolls "You're Summer" 5 94
13 Netherlands Dutch Ben Cramer "De oude muzikant" The old musician 14 69
14 Ireland English Maxi "Do I Dream" 10 80
15 United Kingdom English Cliff Richard "Power to All Our Friends" 3 123
16 France French Martine Clémenceau "Sans toi" Without you 15 65
17 Israel Hebrew Ilanit "Ey Sham" (אי שם) Somewhere 4 97
1.^ Also contains lyrics in EnglishSpanish and French.
2.^ Also contains lyrics in SpanishItalianDutchGermanIrishHebrewSerbo-CroatianFinnishSwedish and Norwegian.

Scoreboard[edit][]

Results
[3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20]
[21] Finland 93 9 5 6 6 5 6 6 7 2 6 7 5 5 9 4 5
Belgium 58 4 3 4 3 6 6 4 4 2 4 2 3 4 5 2 2
Portugal 80 4 6 5 5 4 8 8 6 3 4 2 5 4 5 6 5
Germany 85 2 5 6 4 5 9 7 4 3 7 6 5 6 5 7 4
Norway 89 8 5 5 6 7 6 7 6 5 7 3 3 3 3 6 9
Monaco 85 6 3 2 4 3 6 5 9 8 6 4 5 6 9 5 4
Spain 125 3 8 9 9 4 9 8 9 10 8 7 10 10 4 9 8
Switzerland 79 4 3 3 4 7 5 7 6 4 6 3 8 7 7 2 3
Yugoslavia 65 5 3 3 4 2 5 8 6 2 4 2 4 5 4 4 4
Italy 74 2 5 3 5 5 5 5 7 5 5 5 4 4 5 5 4
Luxembourg 129 6 6 8 7 8 7 6 10 9 9 8 9 8 10 10 8
Sweden 94 8 4 4 5 8 5 7 9 6 5 6 6 5 7 4 5
Netherlands 69 4 4 2 5 5 4 5 5 5 4 7 3 5 3 6 2
Ireland 80 3 7 2 4 6 6 7 5 5 5 6 5 6 5 4 4
United Kingdom 123 9 6 6 7 7 8 4 8 8 5 10 9 10 9 8 9
France 65 4 3 2 4 4 5 5 4 7 2 3 5 5 5 5 2
Israel 97 6 6 5 7 5 7 4 6 7 7 8 6 6 7 5 5

10 points[edit][]

Below is a summary of all perfect 10 scores that were given during the voting.

N. Contestant Voting nation
3 Luxembourg France, Switzerland, United Kingdom
Spain Ireland, Italy, Netherlands
2 United Kingdom Netherlands, Luxembourg

International broadcasts and voting[edit][]

The table below shows the order in which votes were cast during the 1973 contest along with the spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for their respective country. Each national broadcaster also sent a commentator to the contest, in order to provide coverage of the contest in their own native language. Details of the commentators and the broadcasting station for which they represented are also included in the table below.

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