Eurovision 1973
Date: 7 April 1973
Venue: Grand Théâtre, Luxembourg City
Winning country: Luxembourg (4th win)
Winning entry: Anne-Marie David, “Tu te reconnaîtras”
Something that has surprised me, after years of being a Eurofan: there is an astonishing amount of love for “Tu te reconnaîtras”. Sure, Dana and ABBA might be the popular ones, but looking through the blogs and the Reddit posts, they all seem to be liked rather than loved (and in the case of the former, even just tolerated). Anne-Marie David’s two Eurovision entries, on the other hand, seem to enjoy universal acclaim amongst the community; every time the 1973 contest is mentioned, the commenters will be in unanimous agreement that yes, Luxembourg fully deserved that back-to-back win — no small feat, considering that Spain gave us “Eres tú” this year.
The appeal, I think, comes down to personality: Anne-Marie David, unlike so many winners before her, seems to actually have one. Over the last 17 entries, we’ve seen singers do their damnedest to embody the emotions they’re singing — yet more often than not, the result is nothing more than a gurning performer, who milks every turn of phrase for an emotional impact that just isn’t there. David, on the other hand, looks and sounds an actual human being — from beginning to end, she projects warmth and wisdom, as well as a self-confidence that immediately suggests a wealth of experience. One look at her, and you think, “yes, this 20-year-old woman is not bullshitting me. She knows exactly what she’s talking about.”
And that’s all true, but I’d like to dig into that sense of personality a little more. Because this fourth Luxembourgish win — the first-ever undisputed consecutive victory — owed itself in part to Anne-Marie David’s savviness with the medium. Throughout her performance, she fixes her gaze at the camera, as if she is addressing her uplifting words to you and you alone; yes we’ve had performers address the camera before, but none of them did it so intensely, so exclusively. Her words are less Eurovision performance and more friendly pep talk; when in the chorus she says “you will see, you will recognise yourself/ In that child, amongst all these people”, she gives a spontaneous little nod, as if to assure you that you, viewer, have that child in yourself if you would just believe.
All this personality is, of course, part of the performance. Whatever Anne-Marie David’s actual personality, her onstage affirmations and gesticulations are very much part of the package; she fosters a non-existent intimacy with you so effortlessly that it’s hard not to be won over. In that respect, she outstrips almost every single winner that we’ve seen thus far.
At this point, however, you might be wondering: why have I spent so much time discussing Anne-Marie David’s stage presence? Usually by this point I’ll have gone on a long and probably unnecessary tangent about three particular words in the lyrics, and how it feels somewhat inferior to the glam rock that was hitting the charts back then, etc, etc. The reason for this particular neglect, however, is simple: “Tu te reconnaîtras” is all performance. Other than its performance, there is very little I can say that isn’t really a retread of what I’ve already said so many times before. Listen to the melody, and hear how the quiet verses build up to a predictable, showy chorus; read through the lyrics, and fall asleep upon reading the same misty-eyed faux-uplifting bullshit that you have seen in the previous dozen or so entries. It can’t even resist turning itself into just another song about romance at the end. Were it not for Anne-Marie David, there would be little that separates this song from previous ballady winners (quite literally in this case — there are shades of both “Un jour, un enfant” and 1971’s Monegasque entry in the song).
But I also like to think that this particular performance didn’t just enhance the song — it also enhanced Eurovision itself. I’ve said before that Anne-Marie David was by no means the first person to have looked straight at the camera while singing; the practice of dreamy/insouciant detachment (delete as appropriate) seems to have become the rule only in the mid-sixties. Part of this was because Eurovision back then was, in descending order of importance, a stage showcase, a radio programme, and a televisual gala — sound took precedence before vision, and the key audience you needed to impress was ten feet away instead of in faraway Israel. There was really no point in inviting the audience to imagine “dreams of childhood” or “the train station where the adventure of life begins” when the radio audience at home couldn’t even imagine who this lady shouting down the airwaves at them was.
By 1973, however, this would simply not do. Five years after it had debuted at the Contest, most of Western Europe was now seeing the world in colour; it would be silly, therefore, for the singers seen on TV to just stand there and look cute. Compare, if you will, the winners from one year and one decade ago; scrutinise the static pompousness and the overwrought hand gestures of Vicky Leandros, then examine the way abstract vortices swirled around Grethe Ingmann’s face, and how her husband’s finger-picking got a superbly melancholic close-up. It is the latter that still gets talked about more these days, and visual performance and presentation is part and parcel of it, a way of ensuring its survival through the ages — a fact which Anne-Marie David, a consummate performer who had already spent a year playing Mary Magdalene in the French version of Jesus Christ Superstar, clearly understood. The song might be nothing to write home about — all this French talk of hungry artists in an egotistical world, who could relate to that? — but give it enough welly and stare at the camera from time to time, and suddenly everybody might just overlook the cultural barriers, and fall in love with the persona you were presenting.
In a sense, Anne-Marie David may have been the first winner to understand a rule that’s since become predominant at Eurovision: the song forms only part of the package. Even if your song sucks hard, all you need is a gimmicky, show-stopping performance on television, and the odds will swing in your favour (as any casual observer of the Contest nowadays could tell you). And “Tu te reconnaîtras” does kind of suck as a song: its idea of a chanson is inert, uninspiring and awkward; it struggles to distinguish itself from most of the others songs appearing onstage at the Grand Théâtre that night — but David’s charm and star power is undeniable, and her performance largely overrides much of the antipathy I have towards this song. I don’t think it would be hyperbole to suggest that her win for Luxembourg changed, yet again, the concept of what an ESC winner could look like.
Fifty years on, David evidently remains acutely aware of her audience — not only does she STILL willingly participate in Eurovision retrospectives, but she even sings the second half of “Tu te reconnaîtras”, a song that was originally all in French, in English. (A Frenchwoman willingly subjecting herself to the English language! Imagine that.) In her wake, we would see many flaw-hiding performances like hers in years to come: some of them would put their own delightful twist on her recipe for success, while others would suck so bad that no amount of pyrotechnics or stagecraft or performer charisma could EVER repair the damage they wrought on my soul… but we’ll get to said Latvian artist in due course.
Rating: 6/10
Best song
If not for our next winner, this year’s second-place finisher has a claim to being Eurovision’s most famous 1970s export. Mocedades’ “Eres tú” is a lovely canción that subsequently went global, reaching the top ten in the US and Canada and all over Europe; I’ve never fully gotten the love for this one (it’s pleasingly sung, but nothing special), but its hold on millions around the world is indisputable, and respect for this one is very much due. Just one point behind Spain was prodigal son Cliff Richard, now trying to graduate from pretty boy to glam rock star; sadly “Power to All Our Friends” is still a bit too clean-cut for Richard to truly be a proto-Freddie Mercury, although you can’t fault him for trying. (Then again, what the hell are those dance moves?)
This year is a very interesting year: the first few songs are a bit dull and/or tacky, but it significantly picks up after Mocedades takes the stage, and never quite lets down after that — and this is partially why “Eres tú” is my fourth place. Above that is Sweden, for awkwardly clunky lyrics aside (“oh, your breasts are like swallows a-nestling!”), Nova’s “You’re Summer” is still a song that hits me in the feels with how melancholic and desperate it sounds. In my second place, however, is the ESC’s latest debutant: Ilanit’s “Ey Sham” marks the beginning of a string of perfect pop songs by Israel, who churned out banger after banger in the first two decades of their participation in the Contest. “Ey Sham” itself is a promising start, yearning yet confident, the vision it articulates loud and clear — but was just pipped to the post by Yugoslavia, who offered up an exquisite take on a Bond theme. Zdravko Čolić’s “Gori vatra” might seem a bit left-of-field for the country, but this is a dramatic song that demands a singer who’s capable of picking out little nuances in the verses AND belting out the denouement, and my God, does Čolić deliver on both.
(This is the point where I usually embed the video for my favourite song, but unfortunately Mr. Čolić and his team are VERY litigious when it comes to unauthorised videos of “Gori vatra” and for some reason the video of his performance is not embeddable — so you’ll just have to click on the link below to watch it on his official YouTube channel. Don’t blame me, he’s the paranoid one.)
| PLACE | ACTUAL RESULTS | MY PICKS |
|---|---|---|
| 1st | Luxembourg, “Tu te reconnaîtras” | Yugoslavia, “Gori vatra“ |
| 2nd | Spain, “Eres tú” | Israel, “Ey Sham“ |
| 3rd | United Kingdom, “Power to All Our Friends“ | Sweden, “You’re Summer“ |
Next time
The big one. Could you escape, even if you wanted to?
Inkpot Shuffles in the Twilight 
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