1961

VENUE Palais des Festivals, Cannes		ENTRIES 16
HOST Jacqueline Joubert		DEBUTS Spain, Finland, Yugoslavia

Some of the deficiencies of the 10-person jury one-man-one-vote were highlighted this year. On the face of it the UK came a reasonably close second to Luxemburg; however Luxemburg's thirty-one votes came from twelve countries while the UK's twenty-four came from just seven.

BBC coverage of the event now seems very endearingly quaint. including coverage of engineers "connecting" the power supply (two guys connecting a set of huge cables outside the venue on Cannes seafront!).

Three new entrants brought the total number of entries to the mid teens, a level of participation which would remain pretty much constant for the next two decades. Western Europe had embraced the contest. Winner Jean-Claude Pascal made a rather alarming attempt at a comeback twenty years later in 1981. He finished 11th of 20.

Spain	Estando Contigo	Conchita Bautista	9
Monaco	Allons, Allons, Les Enfants	Colette Deréal	10
Austria	Sehnsucht	Jimmy Makulis	15
Finland	Valoa Ikkunassa	Laila Kinnunen	10
Yugoslavia	Neke Davne Zvezde	Ljiljana Petrovic	8
Netherlands	Wat Een Dag	Greetje Kauffeld	10
Sweden	April, April	Lill-Babs	14
Germany	Einmal Sehen Wir Uns Wieder	Lale Andersen	13
France	Printemps	Jean Paul Mauric	4
Switzerland	Nous Aurons Demain	Franca Di Rimnzo	3
Belgium	September Gouden Roos	Bob Benny	15
Norway	Sommer I Palma	Nora Brockstedt	7
Denmark	Angelique	Dario Campeotto	5
Luxembourg	Nous Les Amoureux	Jean-Claude Pascal	1
United Kingdom	Are You Sure?	The Allisons	2
Italy	Al Di Là	Betty Curtis	5

Voting

IN THE NEWS THIS WEEK:

South Africa withdraws from the Commonwealth.