World of Chig   

24.5.06
Happy 50th Birthday to Eurovision!



Yes, it's today! It may well be a whole year since the 50th Eurovision Song Contest, in Kyiv. We've even just had the 51st, in Athens. The EBU's official celebration of 50 years; the huge Congratulations show in Copenhagen that the BBC didn't bother to broadcast (perhaps wisely, I thought, after watching it on the web), was way back in October. Despite all that, it's today that Eurovision celebrates its 50th anniversary. It's a whole half century since Lys Assia won on Thursday 24th May 1956. I wrote all about it last year, so I won't do it again, but why not read what Lys Assia herself has to say about it?

I doubt if she ever thought that 50 years later, the gentile scene above would have been transformed into this...



...but there's progress for you - and Lordi did get flowers too. Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose, as someone probably said in Switzerland that night in 1956.

One thing I'm damn sure Lys Assia didn't foresee was that some concerned fan 'stroke' journalist from Birmingham would have to hurriedly set up his own union flag on the stage before the UK entrant's second press conference, because no one else had bothered, but that's what happened last Tuesday. The things one does for one's country...




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