The Eurovision Song Contest 1973 was the 18th edition of the Eurovision Song Contest, held on 7 April 1973 at the in Luxembourg City, Luxembourg, and presented by Helga Guitton. It was organised by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and host broadcaster (CLT), who staged the event after winning the for with the song "Après toi" by Vicky Leandros.
Broadcasters from a total of eighteen countries signed up to enter the contest, with competing for the first time, while pulled out after taking part in 1972 due to disputes between the broadcaster (ORF) and Austrian record labels. However 's planned participation ultimately failed to materialise, after the Maltese Broadcasting Authority (MBA) deemed the quality of the songs that it had received of too low quality, leaving seventeen countries to participate.
The winner was , represented by the song "", composed by , with lyrics by , and performed by Anne-Marie David. This was Luxembourg's fourth contest victory, matching the record number of contest wins previously set by , and marked the second time that a country had won the contest two years in succession, previously set by . , the , , and rounded out the top five positions, with Israel achieving the best performance for a debut nation since .
With 129 votes out of a possible maximum score of 160, "" remains the best-ever scoring song when compared to the potential maximum available, receiving 80.63% of the maximum vote.
Location
thumb|left|alt=Panoramic shot of the Grand Théâtre de Luxembourg, a modernist-style building, with a pavement fountain in front|250px|, Luxembourg City – host venue of the 1973 contest
The 1973 contest took place in Luxembourg City, Luxembourg, following the country's victory at the with the song "" performed by Vicky Leandros. It was the third time that the event was hosted in Luxembourg, following the contests held in and . as the venue and suggested either 28 April or 5 May 1973 as the date of the event, the latest calendar dates proposed for the contest since its in 1956. A revised date of 7 April was subsequently accepted by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), and announced during the 1972 edition of the Rose d'Or festival in Montreux, Switzerland. The venue's usual capacity of 800 seats was reduced by about 100 to allow space for technical equipment.
Participants
thumb|left|upright|alt=A portrait photo of Cliff Richard taken in 1973|[[Cliff Richard represented the for a second time, having previously placed second in by a single point.]]
Broadcasters from a total of eighteen countries initially signed up for the 1973 event. Seventeen of the eighteen which had participated in were set to returnwith being the only absenceand were joined by in its contest debut. The Israel Broadcasting Authority (IBA), who was eligible to participate as a member of the EBU, became the first broadcaster to enter the contest representing a non-European country. In October 1972 the Greek broadcaster, the National Radio Television Foundation (EIRT), also enquired about entering the contest, however this was past the EBU's cut-off date; it would ultimately enter for the first time at the , in what was 's debut. was among the eighteen countries initially scheduled to compete, however the Maltese Broadcasting Authority (MBA) withdrew its planned participation at a late stage, considering the standard of songs that it had received to be of too low quality for the contest; this left seventeen countries in the contest. among the Belgian duo's backing singers was Claude Lombard, who had represented . 's group had originally performed in the Swedish selection, , as Malta; however to avoid confusion with the country, the group performed at Eurovision as "the Nova". Monica Dominique was the first female conductor in the contest's history when she led the orchestra during the Swedish entry; she was shortly followed by the second female conductor, Nurit Hirsh for , a few songs later.
|-
! scope="col" | Country
! scope="col" | Broadcaster
! scope="col" | Artist
! scope="col" | Song
! scope="col" | Language
! scope="col" | Songwriter(s)
! scope="col" | Conductor
|-
! scope="row" |
| BRT
| Nicole and Hugo
| "Baby Baby"
| Dutch
|
| Francis Bay
|-
! scope="row" |
| YLE
| Marion Rung
| "Tom Tom Tom"
| English
|
| Ossi Runne
|-
! scope="row" |
| ORTF
| Martine Clémenceau
| ""
| French
|
|
|-
! scope="row" |
| HR
| Gitte
| ""
| German
|
| Günther-Eric Thöner
|-
! scope="row" |
| RTÉ
| Maxi
| "Do I Dream"
| English
|
| Colman Pearce
|-
! scope="row" |
| IBA
| Ilanit
| "" <small>()</small>
| Hebrew
|
| Nurit Hirsh
|-
! scope="row" |
| RAI
| Massimo Ranieri
| ""
| Italian
|
| Enrico Polito
|-
! scope="row" |
| CLT
| Anne-Marie David
| ""
| French
|
| Pierre Cao
|-
! scope="row" |
| TMC
| Marie
| ""
| French
|
| Jean-Claude Vannier
|-
! scope="row" |
| NOS
| Ben Cramer
| ""
| Dutch
| Pierre Kartner
| Harry van Hoof
|-
! scope="row" |
| NRK
| Bendik Singers
| "It's Just a Game"
| English, French
|
| Carsten Klouman
|-
! scope="row" |
| RTP
| Fernando Tordo
| ""
| Portuguese
|
|
|-
! scope="row" |
| TVE
| Mocedades
| ""
| Spanish
| Juan Carlos Calderón
| Juan Carlos Calderón
|-
! scope="row" |
| SR
| The Nova
| "You're Summer"
| English
|
| Monica Dominique
|-
! scope="row" |
| SRG SSR
| Patrick Juvet
| ""
| French
|
| Hervé Roy
|-
! scope="row" |
| BBC
| Cliff Richard
| "Power to All Our Friends"
| English
|
| David Mackay
|-
! scope="row" |
| JRT
| Zdravko Čolić
| "" <small>()</small>
| Serbo-Croatian
| Kemal Monteno
|
|}
Production and format
thumb|upright|alt=A photo of Ilanit, holding a microphone on stage in 2016|A large security operation was mobilised to protect , with the nation's artist [[Ilanit (pictured in 2016) rumoured to have worn a bulletproof vest during her performance.]]
The Eurovision Song Contest 1973 was produced by the Luxembourgish public broadcaster (CLT), with some technical assistance provided by the German public broadcaster ARD. The contest was presented by the German radio and television presenter Helga Guitton, a regular presenter on the German-language and the French-language . The preparation and production activities of the contest coincided with the introduction of colour television on in late 1972.
Each participating broadcaster submitted one song, which was required to be no longer than three minutes in duration. A maximum of six performers were allowed on stage during each country's performance. Following the confirmation of the eighteen planned participating countries, the draw to determine the running order of the contest was held on 8 January 1973 at the Villa Louvigny television studios in Luxembourg City, conducted by Jacques Harvey and Helga Guitton in the presence of Clifford Brown for the EBU and Gust Graas and Camille Ernster for CLT.
The voting system used for the previous two years returned: each participating broadcaster appointed two individualsone below the age of 25, the other above, and with at least 10 years between their ageswho awarded each song a score between one and five votes, except for the song from their own country. Audience members were instructed not to stand up during the contest itself at the risk of being shot by armed security within the venue, while Israeli entrant Ilanit was rumoured to have worn a bulletproof vest underneath her outfit during her performance. Additional security was also posted at the Villa Louvigny, where the various commentators were situated during the contest, in particular to protect the UK delegation from potential attack by Irish republican paramilitaries.
The interval act was a performance by the Spanish clown Charlie Rivel, introduced by Guitton as "", who performed a comedic routine in drag as an operatic prima donna. It was the first occurrence of a drag performance at the Eurovision Song Contest, The prize for the winning artist and songwriters was presented by the previous year's winning artist Vicky Leandros. It was Luxembourg's fourth contest victory, following wins in , and 1972, also achieved its best-ever result to that point, with a sixth-place finish. In addition to the traditional full reprise of the winning song by Anne-Marie David, a shorter version of the song was also performed by her during the closing credits. "" was subsequently nominated in 2005 to compete in Congratulations: 50 Years of the Eurovision Song Contest, a special broadcast to determine the contest's most popular entry of its first 50 years as part of the contest's anniversary celebrations. One of fourteen entries chosen to compete, "" ultimately finished in eleventh place.
{| class="sortable wikitable plainrowheaders sticky-header"
|-
|+ Results of the Eurovision Song Contest 1973
|-
! scope="col" |
! scope="col" | Country
! scope="col" | Artist
! scope="col" | Song
! scope="col" class="unsortable" | Votes
! scope="col" | Place
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 1
|
|
| "Tom Tom Tom"
| 93
| 6
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 2
|
| Nicole and Hugo
| "Baby Baby"
| 58
| 17
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 3
|
|
| ""
| 80
| 10
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 4
|
| Gitte
| ""
| 85
| 8
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 5
|
| Bendik Singers
| "It's Just a Game"
| 89
| 7
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 6
|
| Marie
| ""
| 85
| 8
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 7
|
| Mocedades
| ""
| 125
| 2
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 8
|
|
| ""
| 79
| 12
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 9
|
|
| ""
| 65
| 15
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 10
|
|
| ""
| 74
| 13
|- style="font-weight:bold; background:gold;"
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 11
|
|
| ""
| 129
| 1
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 12
|
|
| "You're Summer"
| 94
| 5
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 13
|
|
| ""
| 69
| 14
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 14
|
| Maxi
| "Do I Dream"
| 80
| 10
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 15
|
|
| "Power to All Our Friends"
| 123
| 3
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 16
|
|
| ""
| 65
| 15
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" | 17
|
| Ilanit
| ""
| 97
| 4
|}
Detailed voting results<span class="anchor" id="Scoreboard"></span>
<!-- Anchor in the header is the old section name -->
Jury voting was used to determine the votes awarded by all countries. The announcement of the results from each country's two jury members was conducted in the order in which their nation performed; the jurors were shown on camera when presenting their scores, with each juror using small boards in front of their desks with numbers 1 to 5 which they flipped up to reveal their votes for the country being awarded. The results of three countries at a time were totalled and presented as one score, with all seventeen countries receiving their scores before moving on to the next three countries to award their scores: e.g. in the first round of voting the scores of the Finnish, Belgian and Portuguese juries were revealed together, which were announced as 14 votes for Finland, 9 votes for Belgium, and so on until Israel received the final scores from these three countries, with 17 votes; this was then followed by the votes from the German, Norwegian and Monegasque jurors, which awarded their scores starting again for Finland and ending with Israel, with further countries voting in groups of three in the same manner, with the final group of two comprising the French and Israeli jurors.
|-
! colspan="2" |
! 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="17"
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Finland
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 93 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 9 || 5 || 6 || 6 || 5 || 6 || 6 || 7 || 2 || 6 || 7 || 5 || 5 || 9 || 4 || 5
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Belgium
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 58 || 4 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 3 || 4 || 3 || 6 || 6 || 4 || 4 || 2 || 4 || 2 || 3 || 4 || 5 || 2 || 2
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Portugal
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 80 || 4 || 6 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 5 || 5 || 4 || 8 || 8 || 6 || 3 || 4 || 2 || 5 || 4 || 5 || 6 || 5
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Germany
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 85 || 2 || 5 || 6 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 4 || 5 || 9 || 7 || 4 || 3 || 7 || 6 || 5 || 6 || 5 || 7 || 4
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Norway
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 89 || 8 || 5 || 5 || 6 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 7 || 6 || 7 || 6 || 5 || 7 || 3 || 3 || 3 || 3 || 6 || 9
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Monaco
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 85 || 6 || 3 || 2 || 4 || 3 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 6 || 5 || 9 || 8 || 6 || 4 || 5 || 6 || 9 || 5 || 4
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Spain
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 125 || 3 || 8 || 9 || 9 || 4 || 9 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 8 || 9 || 10 || 8 || 7 || 10 || 10 || 4 || 9 || 8
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Switzerland
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 79 || 4 || 3 || 3 || 4 || 7 || 5 || 7 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 6 || 4 || 6 || 3 || 8 || 7 || 7 || 2 || 3
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Yugoslavia
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 65 || 5 || 3 || 3 || 4 || 2 || 5 || 8 || 6 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 2 || 4 || 2 || 4 || 5 || 4 || 4 || 4
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Italy
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 74 || 2 || 5 || 3 || 5 || 5 || 5 || 5 || 7 || 5 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 5 || 5 || 4 || 4 || 5 || 5 || 4
|- style="background:gold;"
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; font-weight:bold; background:gold;" | Luxembourg
| style="text-align:right; font-weight:bold;" | 129 || 6 || 6 || 8 || 7 || 8 || 7 || 6 || 10 || 9 || 9 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 8 || 9 || 8 || 10 || 10 || 8
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Sweden
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 94 || 8 || 4 || 4 || 5 || 8 || 5 || 7 || 9 || 6 || 5 || 6 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 6 || 5 || 7 || 4 || 5
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Netherlands
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 69 || 4 || 4 || 2 || 5 || 5 || 4 || 5 || 5 || 5 || 4 || 7 || 3 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 5 || 3 || 6 || 2
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Ireland
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 80 || 3 || 7 || 2 || 4 || 6 || 6 || 7 || 5 || 5 || 5 || 6 || 5 || 6 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 5 || 4 || 4
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | United Kingdom
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 123 || 9 || 6 || 6 || 7 || 7 || 8 || 4 || 8 || 8 || 5 || 10 || 9 || 10 || 9 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 8 || 9
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | France
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 65 || 4 || 3 || 2 || 4 || 4 || 5 || 5 || 4 || 7 || 2 || 3 || 5 || 5 || 5 || 5 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"| || 2
|-
! scope="row" style="text-align:left; background:#f2f2f2;" | Israel
| style="text-align:right; background:#f2f2f2;" | 97 || 6 || 6 || 5 || 7 || 5 || 7 || 4 || 6 || 7 || 7 || 8 || 6 || 6 || 7 || 5 || 5 || style="text-align:left; background:#aaa;"|
|}
10 votes
The below table summarises where the potential maximum of 10 votes were awarded from one country to another. The winning country is shown in bold. Luxembourg and Spain each received the maximum score of 10 votes from three of the voting countries, and the United Kingdom received two sets of 10 votes. Known details on the broadcasts in each country, including the specific broadcasting stations and commentators are shown in the tables below.
{| class="wikitable plainrowheaders sticky-header"
|-
|+ Broadcasters and commentators in participating countries
|-
! scope="col" | Country
! scope="col" | Broadcaster
! scope="col" | Channel(s)
! scope="col" | Commentator(s)
! scope="col" |
|-
! scope="rowgroup" rowspan="3" |
| BRT
| BRT, BRT 1
|
| style="text-align:center" |
|-
| rowspan="2" | RTB
| RTB
| Paule Herreman
| style="text-align:center" |
|-
| RTB 1
|
| style="text-align:center" |
|-
! scope="rowgroup" rowspan="3" |
| rowspan="3" | YLE
| TV1
|
| style="text-align:center" rowspan="3" |
|-
|
|
|-
|
|
|-
! scope="row" |
| ORTF
|
| Pierre Tchernia
| style="text-align:center" |
|-
! scope="rowgroup" rowspan="2" |
| rowspan="2" | RTÉ
| RTÉ
| Mike Murphy
| style="text-align:center" |
|-
| RTÉ Radio
| Liam Devally
| style="text-align:center" |
|-
! scope="row" |
| IBA
| Israeli Television
|
| style="text-align:center" |
|-
! scope="row" |
| RAI
|
|
| style="text-align:center" |
|-
! scope="rowgroup" rowspan="3" |
| rowspan="3" | CLT
|
|
| style="text-align:center" |
|-
|
| Raym
| style="text-align:center" |
|-
| Radio Luxembourg
|
| style="text-align:center" |
|-
! scope="row" |
| NRK
| , NRK