After the United Kingdom’s victory in 1981, the 27th edition of the ESC took place in Harrogate, a small town that many viewers in Europe had never heard of it. The contest was held at the Harrogate International Centre on 24 April 1982 and was hosted by English TV presenter and newsreader Jan Leeming. The grand convention and exhibition centre opened short time prior to the contest, and was the first big event held in the main 2000-seat auditorium.
Harrogate grew out of two smaller settlements in North Yorkshire, High Harrogate and Low Harrogate, during the 17th century. As a spa town, Harrogate is a tourist destination and its attractions include its spa waters and RHS Harlow Carr gardens. Nearby is the Yorkshire Dales national park and the Nidderdale AONB. The town became known as 'The English Spa' in the Georgian Era, after its waters were discovered in the 16th century. In the 17th and 18th centuries its 'chalybeate' waters (containing iron) were a popular health treatment, and the influx of wealthy but sickly visitors contributed significantly to the wealth of the town.
In order to making the town of Harrogate known, the BBC came the idea for a map to open the contest. Before Jan Leeming went up the stage, it was played a clip in wich the phrase “Where is Harrogate” was written in each of the national languages of the contendant countries.
After that, to introduce the town, they developed a video of shots around the town, including a shot of a shopping mall window that named all the winners from the UK: Lulu (1969), Sandie Shaw (1967), Brotherhood of Man (1976), and of course Buck’s Fizz (1981). Ireland’s 1970 winner Dana, who is from the Northern Ireland city of Derry (Northern Ireland has been part of the UK since 1920) was also featured in the window spread alongside the second Irish winner Johnny Logan (1980). It is unknown why Logan is featured in the window design as he is from Australia and resided in Ireland at the time.
The Contest
There were 18 participating countries that year. No year since there has had this few participants in competition. The 1982 contest would see two staples of Eurovision pull out of the contest, France and Greece.
Greek withdrawal happened two weeks before the contest. They were set to send Thermis Adamantidis with the song “Sarantapente kopelies” and to perform in second place. To this day ERT has never revealed why the entry was withdrawn from the contest. According to the Eurovision website though, the reason was because ERT was unhappy with the entry. Another theory is that Greece was disqualified after it was revealed that the theme was a previously released song. In fact, it was a known Greek folk song and when it was revised for the competition, it was checked that the theme violated the rules which stated that all songs had to be original in terms of songwriting and instrumentation and cannot be cover songs. Greece was forced to pay a fine and was allowed to return the following year. After returning in 1983, for the 1984 contest, ERT stated that all of the possible songs were of "low quality" and decided not to participate.
France pulling out well before the contest deadline. There are also two theories about it. According to the first one, French broadcaster TF1 declined to participate in November of 1981, with head of entertainment Pierre Bouteiller citing the “lack of talent” and “mediocrity of the songs” as the reason. This would cause the country to miss out until 1983 when Antenne 2 (France 2) would step in to organize the country’s participation and has done so ever since. But another sources suggest that due the downsizing of their national broadcasters, France lost the rights to participating at the contest and so was also forced to withdraw.
Returning artists for 1982
In total that edition saw eight artists return to the contest in Harrogate, with four of them competing as solo artists in the contest for the first time.
For Stella Maessen was the second time representing Belgium but third time at the contest, having represented Belgium in 1977 with the group Dream Express and the Netherlands in 1970. She also received a rare distinction of receiving points from all 18 participating countries despite finishing in 4th place. Her song was entirely in French (although Stella admits that she could hardly speak the language prior to Eurovision).
Fatima Padinha and Teresa Miguel also returned to represent Portugal as part of Doce, having previously participated as members of Gemini in 1978. It would be their fifth try to make it to Eurovision, as Gemini competed in the Portuguese national final in 1977 and 1978, and the members of Doce participated in the same national final in 1980, 1981, and 1982.
Norway’s previous participants Jahn Teigan and Anita Skorgan returned to the contest after Jahn’s 1978 participation and Anita Skorgan’s participation in 1977 and 1979. Anita had performed in Melodi Grand Prix numerous times before 1982, and was also a co-writer on numerous Norwegian entries in the 1980s. Across their two careers, they were present at six contests over seven years (missing out on the 1980 contest).
Also returning was Anna Vissi representing Cyprus (she represented Greece in 1980 and would return for the 2006 contest for Greece again), and Sally Ann Triplett who was a member of the British group Prima Donna in 1980.
Winner: Nicole’s landslide victory in Harrogate
Despite being part of the inaugural broadcast and every contest since (expect for the 1996 contest where they were relegated out), Germany has only won the contest twice. The first ever win for the country would of course happen there in Harrogate with Nicole’s song “Ein bißchen Frieden” and they would have to wait another 28 years to win again with Lena’s song “Satellite”.
Nicole would win the contest by 61 points, which seems like a small margin by today’s results but prior to that the largest gap between 1st and 2nd was only 32 points, the year Israel first won in 1978. This winning margin would not be broken for another 15 years, when Katrina and the Waves beat Ireland’s Marc Roberts by 70 points.
She also held the record for receiving 1.61 times as many points as the runner up for 27 years, when Norway’s Alexander Rybak scored 1.78 times as many points as Iceland in the final. This feat is extremely impressive as the contest was jury voting only until 1997, and then the contest moved to televoting until the 2009 semifinals (in 2001 and 2002 countries could choose between 100% televote or 50/50 voting).
Germany had the advantage of performing last. After coming second in The Hague in 1980 and second in Dublin in 1981, Ralph Siegel and Bernd Meinunger, the song composers, took the first win for Germany. They wrote 18 Eurovision songs between them before and after "Ein bißchen Frieden", 13 of which were for Germany. Over 13 million West Germans watched her victory on television. Germany was the commanding leader for nearly the entire voting process.
Additional anecdotes from the 27th edition of the ESC
Despite winning the previous year, Buck’s Fizz did not appear at the contest to give Nicole the winning trophy
During the postcard an extract of each national anthem was played except for with Israel and the United Kingdom. The Israeli postcard began with the traditional Jewish folk song “Have Nagila” and the UK had “Land of Hope and Glory” play.
The Harrogate International Center was said to be so small that the first three rows of seats had to be removed so that the stage could be expanded for the contest.
The UK’s Sally Ann Triplett has said that she was very fond of her time in Harrogate and knew she might lose to Nicole. She stated in an interview that the ongoing Falklands War and Nicole’s message of peace might have influenced her loss. She would go on to have a very successful musical theater career.
Irish band Chips lost out in their national finals. If they had been successful, would have led to the unique situation of two bands in the same Eurovision with the same name (the other was Sweden).
Spain performed a theme with tango flavour in the middle of the Falklands War between United Kingdom and Argentina (although, almost certainly, it was selected previously to the beginning of the conflict)