The Eurovision Song Contest 1957 was the second edition of the
Eurovision Song Contest
The Eurovision Song Contest (), often known simply as Eurovision, is an international Music competition, song competition organised annually by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) among its members since 1956. Each participating broadcaster ...
. Organised by the
European Broadcasting Union
The European Broadcasting Union (EBU; , UER) is an alliance of Public broadcasting, public service media organisations in countries within the European Broadcasting Area (EBA) or who are member states of the Council of Europe, members of the ...
(EBU) and host broadcaster (HR) on behalf of
ARD, the contest, originally known as the (
) was held on Sunday 3 March 1957 and was hosted at the in
Frankfurt
Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...
, West Germany by German actress
Anaid Iplicjian.
Ten countries took part, with , , and the competing for the first time and joining the original seven participating countries from the first contest in . A number of changes to the rules from the previous year's event were enacted, with each country now represented by only one song, which could be performed by up to two performers on stage. The voting system received an overhaul, with each country's jury now comprising ten individuals which awarded one vote each to their favourite song. The results of the voting were now conducted in public, with a scoreboard introduced to allow the process to be followed by viewers and listeners at home. Jurors were also for the first time not allowed to vote for the song from their own country.
The winner of the contest was the , with the song "" performed by
Corry Brokken
Cornelia Maria "Corry" Brokken (3 December 1932 – 31 May 2016) was a Dutch singer, television presenter and jurist. In 1957, she won the second edition of the Eurovision Song Contest with the song " Net als toen", representing the Netherlands ...
. This was Brokken's second appearance as a participant, after previously representing the Netherlands in 1956; her victory marked the first of five Dutch wins in the contest .
Location

The 1957 contest took place in
Frankfurt
Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...
, West Germany. The selected venue was the , a
music hall
Music hall is a type of British theatrical entertainment that was most popular from the early Victorian era, beginning around 1850, through the World War I, Great War. It faded away after 1918 as the halls rebranded their entertainment as Varie ...
and former broadcasting studio located in the
Dornbusch district, and part of the wider
Broadcasting House Dornbusch
Broadcasting House Dornbusch ("''Funkhaus am Dornbusch''") is headquarters and main broadcasting facility of the German public broadcaster for the state of Hessen, Hessischer Rundfunk.
History
The site and the building were originally intended ...
which serves as the headquarters and main broadcasting facility of the German public broadcaster for the state of
Hesse
Hesse or Hessen ( ), officially the State of Hesse (), is a States of Germany, state in Germany. Its capital city is Wiesbaden, and the largest urban area is Frankfurt, which is also the country's principal financial centre. Two other major hist ...
, (HR).
The contest was held in front of an audience of around 400 people.
A new plan for staging the event was invoked ahead of the 1957 contest, with a different broadcaster organising the contest each year, after Switzerland's
SRG SSR
The Swiss Broadcasting Corporation (; ; ; ; SRG SSR) is the Swiss public broadcasting association, founded in 1931, the holding company of 24 radio and television channels. Headquartered in Bern, the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation is a non-pro ...
, which had both hosted the contest and provided the winning entry in , declined to stage it for a second time.
Germany was subsequently selected to host the second edition, after Hans-Otto Grünefeldt, TV program director at HR, offered to organise it on behalf of
ARD.
Frankfurt
Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...
was selected as host city as early as June 1956 during an
EBU
The European Broadcasting Union (EBU; , UER) is an alliance of Public broadcasting, public service media organisations in countries within the European Broadcasting Area (EBA) or who are member states of the Council of Europe, members of the ...
meeting in Italy.
Participants
Ten countries participated in the 1957 contest, with the seven countries which took part in the first contest being joined by , and the in their first appearances.
Austria and Denmark had originally planned to compete in 1956, but missed the cut-off date for entry.
Two of the participating artists, Switzerland's
Lys Assia
Rosa Mina Schärer (3 March 1924 – 24 March 2018), known by her stage name Lys Assia, was a Swiss singer who won the first Eurovision Song Contest in . Assia was born in Rupperswil, Aargau, and began her stage career as a dancer, but changed ...
and the Netherlands'
Corry Brokken
Cornelia Maria "Corry" Brokken (3 December 1932 – 31 May 2016) was a Dutch singer, television presenter and jurist. In 1957, she won the second edition of the Eurovision Song Contest with the song " Net als toen", representing the Netherlands ...
, had previously competed at the 1956 contest. Brokken was one of the two Dutch participants in that year's contest, competing with the song "", while Assia had performed both of Switzerland's entries, "" and "", the latter of which had won the contest.
Format
The contest was organised and broadcast by HR on behalf of ARD, with
Michael Kehlmann serving as director and
Willy Berking serving as
musical director
A music director, musical director or director of music is a person responsible for the musical aspects of a performance, production, or organization. This would include the artistic director and usually chief conductor of an orchestra or concert ...
, leading the during the event.
Each country was allowed to nominate their own musical director to lead the orchestra during the performance of their country's entry, with the host musical director also
conducting
Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or Choir, choral concert. It has been defined as "the art of directing the simultaneous performance of several players or singers by the use of gesture." The primary d ...
for those countries which did not nominate their own conductor.
The stage built in the featured a wooden staircase for the artists and conductors to make their entrance, and a
lyre
The lyre () (from Greek λύρα and Latin ''lyra)'' is a string instrument, stringed musical instrument that is classified by Hornbostel–Sachs as a member of the History of lute-family instruments, lute family of instruments. In organology, a ...
-shaped background for the singers, which should symbolize the history of popular songs since the Middle Ages.
The centre of the background contained a removable background, allowing for a different graphic to be used for each nation's performance.
The background of the orchestra featured photographs from different European landmarks, such as the
Brandenburg Gate
The Brandenburg Gate ( ) is an 18th-century Neoclassical architecture, neoclassical monument in Berlin. One of the best-known landmarks of Germany, it was erected on the site of a former city gate that marked the start of the road from Berlin t ...
, the
Colosseum
The Colosseum ( ; , ultimately from Ancient Greek word "kolossos" meaning a large statue or giant) is an Ellipse, elliptical amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, Italy, just east of the Roman Forum. It is the largest ancient amphi ...
and the
Arc de Triomphe
The Arc de Triomphe de l'Étoile, often called simply the Arc de Triomphe, is one of the most famous monuments in Paris, France, standing at the western end of the Champs-Élysées at the centre of Place Charles de Gaulle, formerly named Plac ...
.
Curtains were used extensively as backgrounds and decorative elements.
The entire contest, including the performances and voting, lasted around one hour in total.
Held just over nine months after the inaugural contest, the contest date of 3 March remains the earliest date in the calendar year in which the contest has been held.
A number of changes from the rules of the previous year's contest were enacted in 1957. Each country was now permitted to send only one song to compete, as opposed to the maximum of two in 1956. Up to two people were now allowed on stage during the performance, however no other vocal backing was allowed.
A new voting system was introduced, with ten individuals in each country giving one vote to their favourite song, with no abstentions allowed.
In an additional change to the 1956 rules, jurors were not allowed to vote for the song from their own country.
A
scoreboard
A scoreboard is a large board for publicly displaying the score (sport), score in a game. Most levels of sport from high school and above use at least one scoreboard for keeping score, measuring time, and displaying statistics. Scoreboards i ...
was introduced for the first time, and the voting process was now included as part of the broadcast, rather than conducted in secret as in 1956. This new aspect of the contest was inspired by the United Kingdom's ''
Festival of British Popular Songs
The Festival of British Popular Songs 1956 was a song contest organised by BBC Television and the inaugural edition of the ''Festival of British Popular Songs'', which became the United Kingdom's national selection process for the 1957 Eurovisi ...
'', which included voting by regional juries and the running total being shown on a scoreboard, a
telerecording
Kinescope , shortened to kine , also known as telerecording in Britain, is a recording of a television program on motion picture film directly through a lens focused on the screen of a video monitor. The process was pioneered during the 1940s ...
of which was viewed by EBU organisers.
Each jury assembled in their own country to follow the contest on television and were then contacted by telephone by the contest's presenter in order to announce their votes, in a change from 1956 when the jurors were co-located to the contest venue.
Each song, as in 1956, was required to last no longer than three minutes and 30 seconds, however several of the competing entries went beyond this limit. Italy's song, which lasted for five minutes and nine seconds, remains the longest song in the contest's history and, despite heavy protest, was not disqualified.
Conversely, the United Kingdom's first entry lasted for one minute and 53 seconds in total, and remained the shortest song to compete in the contest until .
Subsequently the restriction on song length was more strictly monitored from onwards.
The draw that determined the running order was held on 2 March 1957.
Contest overview

The contest was held on 3 March 1957 at 21:00 (
CET
CET or cet may refer to:
Places
* Cet, Albania
* Cet, standard astronomical abbreviation for the constellation Cetus
* Colchester Town railway station (National Rail code CET), in Colchester, England
Arts, entertainment, and media
* Comcast En ...
) and lasted 1 hour.
The event was hosted by German actress
Anaid Iplicjian.
The winner was the represented by the song "", composed by Guus Jansen, written by
Willy van Hemert
Willem Catharinus (Willy) van Hemert (29 March 1912 – 26 June 1993) was a Dutch actor and theatre and television director, but is best known as a songwriter who penned two winning Dutch songs for the Eurovision Song Contest.
Biography
Van Hem ...
and performed by Corry Brokken. Notable among this year's participants were Denmark's
Birthe Wilke
Birthe Wilke (born 19 March 1936) is a Danish singer. She grew up in a musical family in Copenhagen's Vesterbro area.
Career
When Wilke was in her teens, she won a talent competition at the National Scala Theatre in Copenhagen, sang as sol ...
and
Gustav Winckler
Gustav Frands Wilzeck Winckler (13 October 1925 – 20 January 1979) was a popular Danish singer, composer and music publisher. He grew up in the Nørrebro district of Copenhagen and started his career as a decorator.
In 1948 as a young man he ...
, the first duo to compete in the contest, who made an impact with a passionate on-screen kiss at the end of their performance; and Germany's
Margot Hielscher
Margot Hielscher (29 September 1919 – 20 August 2017) was a German singer and film actress. She appeared in over fifty films between and 1939 and 1994.
Hielscher was born in Berlin. In 1957, she was chosen to represent Germany at the Eurovis ...
, the first Eurovision act to use a
prop
A prop, formally known as a (theatrical) property, is an object actors use on stage or screen during a performance or screen production. In practical terms, a prop is considered to be anything movable or portable on a stage or a set, distinct ...
during their performance, in this instance a telephone.
An award was presented to the winning composer for the first time, taking the form of a
medal
A medal or medallion is a small portable artistic object, a thin disc, normally of metal, carrying a design, usually on both sides. They typically have a commemorative purpose of some kind, and many are presented as awards. They may be in ...
lion, which was awarded at the end of the broadcast by ,
director
Director may refer to:
Literature
* ''Director'' (magazine), a British magazine
* ''The Director'' (novel), a 1971 novel by Henry Denker
* ''The Director'' (play), a 2000 play by Nancy Hasty
Music
* Director (band), an Irish rock band
* ''D ...
of . The medallion had been commissioned by
Deutsches Fernsehen and designed by sculptor .
It featured the
Eurovision
The Eurovision Song Contest (), often known simply as Eurovision, is an international song competition organised annually by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) among its members since 1956. Each participating broadcaster submits an origina ...
logo and the words "Grand Prix 1957" on one side, and the mythological figure
Europa
Europa may refer to:
Places
* Europa (Roman province), a province within the Diocese of Thrace
* Europa (Seville Metro), Seville, Spain; a station on the Seville Metro
* Europa City, Paris, France; a planned development
* Europa Cliffs, Alexan ...
on a bull on the other side.
Spokespersons
Each participating broadcaster appointed a spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for its respective country via telephone. Known spokespersons at the 1957 contest are listed below.
*
Detailed voting results
The announcement of the results from each country was conducted in reverse order to the order in which each country performed.
Broadcasts
Broadcasters competing in the event were required to relay the contest via its networks; non-participating EBU member broadcasters were also able to relay the contest. In total, the contest was broadcast in 12 countries. Broadcasters were able to send commentators to provide coverage of the contest in their own native language and to relay information about the artists and songs to their television viewers. Known details on the broadcasts in each country, including the specific broadcasting stations and commentators are shown in the tables below.
The 1957 contest is the earliest edition to exist in full in the EBU's archives, as the 1956 edition has survived solely through audio recordings, with some missing segments, and limited video footage of the winning reprise performance through
newsreel
A newsreel is a form of short documentary film, containing news, news stories and items of topical interest, that was prevalent between the 1910s and the mid 1970s. Typically presented in a Movie theater, cinema, newsreels were a source of cu ...
and other recordings.
Although the number of households which had access to a television in Europe continued to grow, this edition, as in the case of the 1956 contest, was still mainly accessed by spectators via radio.
Notes and references
Notes
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
External links
*
{{Coord, 50, 08, 09, N, 08, 40, 33, E, type:event, display=title
1957
Events January
* January 1 – The Saarland joins West Germany.
* January 3 – Hamilton Watch Company introduces the first electric watch.
* January 5 – South African player Russell Endean becomes the first batsman to be Dismissal (cricke ...
Music festivals in Germany
1957 in music
1957 in West Germany
Music in Frankfurt
20th century in Frankfurt
Events in Frankfurt
1950s in Hesse