We’re off to Luxembourg, which is the smallest country to have ever hosted Eurovision (Monaco won in 1971, but the UK hosted in 1972). No changes in the lineup, nobody new joined or withdrew, for the first time in the contest’s history. Our host is Mireille Delannoy, who welcomes every participating country in their language, which is always something I’ll approve of.
This is one of several times we’ll be returning to Luxembourg. The voting system got a bit of an overhaul this year. Instead of having 10 points the jury can spread out in any way, this year the juries are giving 3, 2 and 1 points to their top 3. On one hand, I like this new system because it’ll make voting go much quicker. On the other, this will result in several songs that would’ve certainly scored higher under the old system to get very poor results.
Mireille calls Luxembourg “the heart of Europe”, which is a bit funny to me as there are many countries that consider themselves to be “the heart of Europe”.
I always get blindsighted by how short the introductions were in the early years, so in just 3 minutes, we get to our first song.
For the second year in a row, random draw gives us a great opener. It’s upbeat, fun and joyful. There’s a small call-and-response section in the middle of the song, which is quite cute.
Unfortunately, the song is too repetitive for my tastes. The “tipi-tii” line is cute at first, but gets a bit annoying rather quickly. Also, it lacks dynamism. It just doesn’t feel like the song is going anywhere.
Score: 62
Fud’s song kept getting better and better with each appearance. In fact, I think this one is his best and absolutely didn’t deserve a zero (you’ll see this phrase a couple more times). It’s definitely the downside to the new system - jurors can’t “rebel” and vote for an unpopular song. Instead, their opinion is taken as a consensus and even if a single juror may have liked this song the most, their voice would’ve been drowned out. And being performed second did it no favours either.
The song is really “epic”, with lots of brass, which gives it a rather distinct sound compared to other songs. The sound mixing can be quite poor at times (what is it with Luxembourg and sound mixing - but more on this in 1973) with the orchestra almost completely drowning out his vocals. Nevertheless, I think the song is still enjoyable.
This song is very dramatic, exactly what I’d expect from Spain, but wow, the sound mixing is really bad on this one. The orchestra overpowers him nearly all the time because the instrumental is much louder and powerful than Belgium’s.
If one gets past these issues, you get a dramatic, somewhat operatic ballad about love that sounds unashamedly Spanish. It’s dynamic, Victor’s voice is rich and powerful and adds a lot to the performance.
This is also the second song to have scored a zero (and, once again, entirely undeservedly). It kinda makes sense, since Portugal wasn’t in the contest yet and Spanish style of music can be a bit off-putting to the more conservative juries.
Luckily, I’m not a 1962 juror and can rank this song however I want.
If Spain had a somewhat operatic ballad, then this is a full-blown opera. And I’m sure it’s good as far as opera goes, but I really don’t like opera. Her voice sounds grating to me, very high-pitched.
This was the third zero-pointer, and even though I didn’t enjoy it, I don’t think it deserved a zero, though I think most jurors felt the same way as me.
This is still fairly operatic, but much toned down, almost dream-like, which is fittin for an entry titled “Lullaby”. It has a very nice flow and fits Danish very well (at least in my opinion).
The problem is that “nice” and “pleasant” are all I can say about this song. I don’t dislike it, but I don’t like it very much either.
Songs like these make me very glad to be watching these contests. They make it worth it to sit through songs I don’t like.
Where do I even start? The performance is wonderful. Inger just oozes charm and charisma. Her performance makes this song feel like it’s no more than a minute long. She captivates you from the first and to the last note.
Now, the instrumental. It’s jaunty, bouncy, upbeat and uptempo. It’s very heavy on the strings, but incorporates plenty of brass too. It feels dynamic and makes you want to get up and move (or bop your head at the very least). There’s even a call-and-response section near the end. And the key change is executed really well too. What’s not to love?
The lyrics are interesting too. Unlike a lot of Eurovision songs, which use the ABAB rhyming scheme (first line rhymes with the third and the second rhymes with the fourth), this uses the AABB scheme (first line rhymes with the second and the third with the fourth). This is a common trick to make it feel like the song is moving quicker than it is, and it absolutely works here.
On a less technical level, the lyrics have a nice message that it’s fine to make mistakes when you’re young. “When it’s sun and spring and you’re nineteen years old / You understand so little”, “It was the first sunny day of spring / So I was stupid enough to say yes” and so on. While a song doesn’t need to have a strong message for me to like it, it’s always a positive when it does.
Surely, this song must’ve scored highly. checks Wikipedia Oh, it only got four points, three of them from Denmark. It’s no surprise though, the juries have never been particularly fond of languages other than English, French and Italian.
Once again, I’m not a juror and can give this song whatever score I want.
Germany continues to deliver. So far, they’ve sent some great songs. Unfortunately, this isn’t one of their best ones.
This song is fairly simple, but it works in this case. The lyrics are nice as well, telling a tale of two immigrant workers from Italy who want to go home and see their girlfriends. The problem is that the lyrics get a bit repetitive. I realise that it’s probably intentional, but that doesn’t help.
In addition to that, I can’t get past the vocals. They fit the song, but they’re a bit grating to my ears.
This all results in a song that I didn’t really enjoy listening to.
I absolutely love the instrumental here. It uses so many different instruments to create a sound that’s extremely distinct from everything else. There’s a very prominent glockenspiel (I recently learnt that what I’ve been calling a xylphone is actually a glockenspiel), trumpets and strings combined to make the song very bouncy.
Sadly, there was a power failure which made the screen go almost black (except for the performers’ white shirts), and it’s theorised that this is the reason why this song got a zero. If that’s true, then it reflects very poorly on the juries as you could still hear the song perfectly fine.
Normally, I’m not a fan of entries like this, but something about this just works. The instrumental is dialled back, which allows Isabelle to flex her vocal abilities and does she have those.
To some, her singing may be a bit monotonous, but I disagree. I think she has a marvellous control over her intonation and volume. She sounds gentle and longing, exactly the kind of mood I’d expect from an entry like this.
Despite being reserved, the instrumental sounds quite contemporary for 1962 (though not as contemporary as some other entries this year). Strings are the most prominent, with brass coming in at several points, but it also features woodwinds, which isn’t something a lot of Eurovision entries use.
Overall, this is the French chanson formula perfected and slightly modernised, and I’m here for it.
In a nice contrast with most other entries, this song sounds fairly jazzy. The vocals are rather dreamy all throughout, but the instrumental goes through several moods. At the start, we get a big introduction, but the orchestra recedes into the background and lets Inger take the front role. Her vocals are rather dreamy and slow all throughout. We get a big instrumental break before the final verse.
All in all, I think this entry was fine and managed to stand on its own just fine.
Jean Philippe is back with a song that… isn’t as good as his previous one. He tried his best with this one, you can tell. His face was very expressive and emotive, but it couldn’t save this quite bland and formulaic chanson. It’s sad, because his previous song was fun, if a bit goofy.
The instrumental is really good though, which saves the song from being completely at the bottom. I especially liked the staccato trumpets coming in at times.
Based on the opening, I thought this would go in a completely different direction. “A powerful, majestic start,” as two Swedes put it slightly over five decades later. We got bongo drums, which haven’t been used before.
Sadly, this is another faily average ballad that I don’t really have a lot to say about lyrically, but the instrumental is great in parts where it’s allowed to shine (i.e. the opening and the instrumental break). It really saves this song from being even lower than it is.
The chorus is extremely catchy, but I can’t say I care for the verses that much. His delivery of the verses is a bit speech-like, which doesn’t really work for me here.
It’s clear that the UK found their style and stuck to it for a while, as it resembles the entries from 1959 and 1960 quite a lot.
Once again, I find the song itself to be rather uninteresting, but like the instrumental. This time, it’s in 6/8 and the hi-hat is keeping a steady rhythm on every beat.
By this point, it becomes apparent that this year has the same problem as the last one - too many songs that sound the same are lumped together because random draw doesn’t care about how well songs flow into one another.
Now this is how you do opera in Eurovision (take notes, Austria). The singer gives it his all, but doesn’t overdo it. My grandma loves Italian music and musical theatre, and this sounds exactly like something she’d listen to (who knows, maybe she does listen to this song).
It’s also accompanied by a majestic instrumental. The orchestra is in perfect unison with the singer to create something better than the sum of its parts.
It’s definitely the most emotional song this year and that helps it to stand out. I can definitely feel his pain of having to say goodbye to his love.
For the second year in a row, we get a song that works really well as a closer, despite the random draw.
It’s still a French chanson, but a much more epic one than the other chansons this year. Everything is slightly dialled up. The vocals are quite powerful, the instrumentation is epic, though I think they’re overdoing it a tiny bit (though I do love the way he belts out the words “cent fois” at the end).
I definitely understand why it came second - being performed last is a great booster and the juries of this era loved French chansons.
I swear I’m not trying to have a different country as my winner every year. It’s just that a lot of countries are still trying to figure out what they want to send, which means the song styles are always in flux. Except for a couple of countries that have figured out their style.
I liked this year much more than 1961. It felt much more balanced between upbeat songs and ballads, though the random draw put most of the former in the first half and most of the latter in the second half. This is also the first year where the running order bias becomes really apparent - all four zero pointers were performed in the first half.
The voting was quite lopsided, with France getting a big lead right at the start and never letting go. I was pleasantly surprised by several juries giving their 3 points (maximum here) to Yugoslavia. Another big surprise was the UK giving their 3 points to Finland.
Anyway, the voting system used this year isn’t very good. Luckily, we’ll be using a sightly expanded version of this system next year, with every country giving 5, 4, 3, 2 and 1 points instead of just 3, 2 and 1.
Anyway, it’s back to the UK next year, with no changes to the lineup for the second time in a row.