Congratulations: 50 Years of the Eurovision Song Contest was a television programme organised by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) to commemorate the Eurovision Song Contest's fiftieth anniversary and to determine the contest's most popular entrant of its fifty years. Hosted by Katrina Leskanich and Renārs Kaupers, the event took place at Forum, in Copenhagen, Denmark, on 22 October 2005. The host broadcaster was the Danish Broadcasting Corporation (DR). Fourteen songs from the contest's first half-century, chosen through an internet poll and by a jury, contested the event.Michael Dwyer (20 October 2005). Dearth of the cool. The Age. Retrieved on 26 December 2007.
Thirty-one EBU-member countries broadcast the concert (although notably , , and the did not) and televoting and juries in these countries decided the winner. A total of 2.5 million votes were cast during the live broadcast.Jeffrey de Hart (25 October 2005). ABBA's "Waterloo" named best Eurovision song. Billboard.com. Retrieved on 26 December 2007. The event was won by the song "Waterloo" by group ABBA, who did not attend; the act had originally won the contest for .
To coincide with the event, the EBU released two double album CDs featuring Eurovision songs from the previous fifty years. Two DVDs with original Eurovision performances of these songs were also released.
Organisation In November 2002, Jürgen Meier-Beer from the Reference Group of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) announced plans to organize a special jubilee programme in 2005 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Eurovision Song Contest. At the time no host broadcaster was announced, with German broadcaster Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR) and the Dutch broadcasting organization Nederlandse Omroep Stichting (NOS) reportedly as potential hosts.
Change of host broadcaster In June 2004, the EBU announced that it was to hold a concert to celebrate fifty years of the contest. The event was to be held on 16 October 2005 at the Royal Albert Hall in London, United Kingdom. The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) was to be the host broadcaster for the concert. The Royal Albert Hall was reportedly unavailable, so in August 2004 the EBU announced that Denmark's DR would stage the event instead. Eurovision Song Contest supervisor Svante Stockselius said that their previous experience of hosting Eurovision events (the and the in 2003) were influential in the EBU's choice. The event was codenamed Extravaganza.
Eurovision winner Dana International, who appeared at the event, later went to suggest that the reason behind the change of host broadcaster was also due to the fact that the BBC wanted to present the show "with humour" as though to poke fun at the contest, an idea that proved to be less popular with the EBU. The BBC ended up not broadcasting the show from Copenhagen, and went on to broadcast their own 50th anniversary programme, Boom Bang-a-Bang: 50 Years of Eurovision, in May 2006. The programme featured archive footage and highlights of past contests, along with a performance of that year's UK entry by Daz Sampson and was hosted by Terry Wogan.
Selection of venue and hosts
On 25 October 2004, Copenhagen was confirmed as the host city for the event, which was now scheduled to take place on 22 October 2005.Roel Phillips (25 October 2004). Extravaganza on 22 October in Copenhagen. ESCtoday.com. Retrieved on 26 December 2007. In May 2005 Congratulations was confirmed as the official name of the concert. A month later DR announced that Forum Copenhagen would host the programme. The chosen venue had previously hosted the first edition of the Junior Eurovision Song Contest.
On 9 September 2005, DR announced that Katrina Leskanich and Renārs Kaupers would present the concert. Leskanich was the lead singer of Katrina and The Waves, who won the contest for the . Kaupers is the lead singer of Latvian group Brainstorm, who represented as the country's debut in the contest. Tickets for the event went on sale on 22 August 2005 from 10:00 (CET) and sold out in just over one hour. The event was attended by an audience of 6,000.
Participating songs Fourteen songs competed in Congratulations. In May 2005, the EBU opened a poll on its website to decide ten songs that would contest the event. Voters chose their two favourite songs from each of five decades: 1956 to 1965, 1966 to 1975, 1976 to 1985, 1986 to 1995 and 1996 to 2005. The remaining four songs would be selected by the EBU's Reference Group.
On 16 June 2005 the fourteen chosen songs were announced, although no indication was given as to which had been chosen online and which by the Reference Group. Eleven of the fourteen songs were Eurovision winners; only "", "Congratulations" and "" (which all finished in the top three at the contest) were not. Two countries, the and , were represented twice on the list. Johnny Logan, who won the contest twice for Ireland as a singer, had both of his songs featured on the list.
First round All 31 countries broadcasting the contest voted in the first round. The five songs that are marked in orange qualified to the second and final round.
Year Country Artist Song Language Place Points 1 Cliff Richard "Congratulations" English 8 105 2 Johnny Logan "What's Another Year" English 12 74 3 Dana International "Diva" Hebrew 13 39 4 Mocedades "Eres tú" Spanish 11 90 5 Nicole "Ein bißchen Frieden" German 7 106 6 Domenico Modugno "Nel blu, dipinto di blu" Italian 2 200 7 ABBA "Waterloo" English 1 331 8 Olsen Brothers "Fly on the Wings of Love" English 6 111 9 France Gall "Poupée de cire, poupée de son" French 14 37 10 Sertab Erener "Everyway That I Can" English 9 104 11 Celine Dion "Ne partez pas sans moi" French 10 98 12 Johnny Logan "Hold Me Now" English 3 182 13 Brotherhood of Man "Save Your Kisses for Me" English 5 154 14 Helena Paparizou "My Number One" English 4 167
Second round All 31 countries broadcasting the contest voted in the second round.
Year Country Artist Song Language Place Points 1 Domenico Modugno "Nel blu, dipinto di blu" Italian 2 267 2 ABBA "Waterloo" English 1 329 3 Johnny Logan "Hold Me Now" English 3 262 4 Brotherhood of Man "Save Your Kisses for Me" English 5 230 5 Helena Paparizou "My Number One" English 4 245
Scoreboard
Both juries and televoting were used at Congratulations; both having an equal influence over the vote. In the first round of voting, the number of songs was reduced to five. Each country awarded points from one to eight, then ten and finally twelve for their ten most popular songs. Unlike in the Contest proper, viewers were allowed to vote for songs which had represented their country. The top five songs were then subjected to another round of voting, where only six points and above were awarded. The voting was conducted in private, and the results were not announced until after the show. The song with the most points in the second round was the winner.
The full scoreboard is as follows:
First round + Voting results in the first round scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" rowspan="14" "Congratulations" 105 8 10 1 5 8 6 1 2 3 5 5 5 10 3 4 7 2 4 1 1 2 7 5 "What's Another Year" 74 2 4 6 5 4 1 6 8 3 3 2 3 6 6 4 6 1 4 "Diva" 39 3 1 3 12 2 2 1 6 2 3 4 "Eres tú" 90 10 10 5 3 10 4 10 1 12 6 3 12 1 3 "Ein bißchen Frieden" 106 1 3 2 3 3 4 5 3 8 6 2 7 7 1 4 5 5 7 3 1 3 8 4 4 4 3 "Nel blu, dipinto di blu" 200 6 7 6 7 10 5 8 7 8 7 2 4 6 8 7 6 8 2 6 8 7 10 8 10 8 5 8 10 6 "Waterloo" 331 12 12 12 8 12 10 12 12 12 7 10 10 8 12 12 8 8 12 10 12 12 12 8 12 12 12 10 12 10 8 12 "Fly on the Wings of Love" 111 3 5 1 6 10 6 12 7 10 10 2 7 2 8 3 1 3 4 8 3 "Poupée de cire, poupée de son" 37 8 8 1 2 1 3 7 1 2 1 1 2 "Everyway That I Can" 104 2 10 2 6 8 4 4 3 7 1 1 4 8 5 5 5 2 5 3 7 12 "Ne partez pas sans moi" 98 7 1 3 2 1 5 1 1 1 4 10 3 10 2 1 8 3 4 4 2 12 5 8 "Hold Me Now" 182 4 5 6 8 7 7 7 10 10 2 12 5 4 12 12 5 7 10 2 5 10 10 7 6 6 2 1 "Save Your Kisses for Me" 154 4 6 4 7 4 8 2 3 6 8 6 6 5 6 5 7 10 10 2 8 6 6 6 2 7 10 "My Number One" 167 5 2 7 12 4 12 2 5 12 6 4 3 5 5 4 4 1 3 4 1 12 7 7 5 7 10 5 6 7
12 points Below is a summary of the maximum 12 points each country awarded in the first round: N. Contestant Nation(s) giving 12 points 18 "Waterloo" , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , 4 , , , 3 , , 2 , 1 "Diva"
Second round + Voting results in the second round scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" scope="col" rowspan="5" "Nel blu, dipinto di blu" 267 10 10 8 10 8 7 6 10 12 8 10 7 7 8 12 8 8 10 6 6 8 8 7 10 7 10 10 7 10 12 7 "Waterloo" 329 12 12 12 8 10 10 12 12 7 7 12 10 10 12 10 10 10 12 12 12 12 7 8 12 10 12 12 12 12 8 12 "Hold Me Now" 262 6 7 10 7 12 8 10 8 8 10 8 12 8 6 6 12 12 7 10 10 6 12 12 6 8 8 6 8 7 6 6 "Save Your Kisses for Me" 230 7 8 6 6 6 6 8 7 6 6 7 6 12 10 8 7 6 8 8 8 10 10 6 8 6 7 8 6 6 7 10 "My Number One" 245 8 6 7 12 7 12 7 6 10 12 6 8 6 7 7 6 7 6 7 7 7 6 10 7 12 6 7 10 8 10 8
12 points Below is a summary of the maximum 12 points each country awarded in the second round: N. Contestant Nation(s) giving 12 points 17 "Waterloo" , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , 6 , , , , , 4 , , , 3 , , 1
Performances The show started with the traditional Eurovision "Te Deum" theme followed by a message from Cliff Richard. After a quick montage of all 14 songs, the orchestra began playing "Ding-a-Dong" (), with dancers on stage. "A-Ba-Ni-Bi" (), "Le dernier qui a parlé..." (), and "Dschinghis Khan" () was also played and accompanied by choreography, which was then followed by "Love Shine a Light" () sung by the co-host, Katrina Leskanich, who came out with flag holders of all the countries that have participated in Eurovision up to that point.
Throughout the telecast, a number of highlights segments were presented which showed montages of various Eurovision performances which were either interesting, notable or unorthodox. There were six assortments, which were under the categories described by the hosts as 'past winners', 'political, daring, larger than life', 'cute men', 'unforgettable interpretation of dance', 'girlpower' and 'close/narrow second-place finishers'. A number of former Eurovision artists returned to help introduce and present the show, including Carola Häggkvist, Massiel, Dana International, Birthe Wilke, Anne-Marie David, Sandra Kim, Elisabeth Andreassen, Hanne Krogh, Olsen Brothers, Emilija Kokić, Marie Myriam, Sertab Erener, Helena Paparizou, Nicole and Hugo, Cheryl Baker, and Lys Assia. Cliff Richard and Nicole gave pre-recorded messages as they were unable to attend.
During the show, there were many presentations by various guest artists during the voting and tallying period. These consisted of the Finnish shouting choir Mieskuoro Huutajat, Riverdance (the 1994 interval act), Ronan Keating (the 1997 co-host), and Johnny Logan, singing his new single "When a Woman Loves a Man", as well as an appearance by the Belgian duo of 1973, Nicole and Hugo.