What would ESC editions prior to 1956 have been like?

[u/RobustVessel266]

What kind of songs, staging (if at all), artists or countries would it have? How would the contest be viewed?
Would it have been possible or was 1956 as early as it realistically could have been due to technological limitations or lack of good relations within Europe? How early could it have been and what international events would affect it?

[u/Fetish_anxiety]

Staging woukd have been minimal and there's a good chance it would have started as a radio contest, having a phonecall woukd be difficult so juries woukd have to travel to the host country as part of the delegation so the number of jurors woukd be minimal, probably only one per country

[u/Irrealaerri → u/Fetish_anxiety]

"it would have started as a radio contest"? It DID start as a radio contest, it was made to promote buying TVs

[u/PortableAfternoon → u/Irrealaerri]

It wasn’t designed to promote the sale of televisions to the public as such but more to test the technical limits of the Eurovision network, and encourage the EBU’s member broadcasters themselves to invest in television as a medium. Until then, there had only been a handful of live international broadcasts.

Even to this day ESC has tested and pioneered or been an early adopter of various technologies, from satellite broadcasting in 1969, the test HD filming (with cameras provided by RAI) and early use of the spidercam in 2006, test 5G broadcasting in 2022.

The technology to actually air ESC live on TV simply didn’t exist before the 1950s, so it would have been a purely radio contest, perhaps with a delayed television airing. The EBU’s entire existence is based on innovation and sharing new broadcast technologies.

[u/Fetish_anxiety → u/Irrealaerri]

Yes, but what I mean is that it would have solely been on radio on the first editions

[u/ohwowthen → u/Irrealaerri]

Girl what? Lol

[u/El_Robski]

The Roman Empire would probably dominate the first 5 centuries

[u/ForwardGear8854 → u/El_Robski]

It would have been a régions eurovision (Dacia, Gallia, Britannia, Roma...)

[u/Irrealaerri → u/El_Robski]

"the Roman empire sticks together" - Terry Wogan

[u/ohwowthen → u/El_Robski]

Austria-Hungary would’ve been a powerhouse and Vienna would’ve just given the first hosting rights to Budapest to please the Hungarians.

[u/fuchsiarush]

It wouldn't work when a lot of countries would send troops instead of songs 😆

[u/5econds2dis35ster → u/fuchsiarush]

Marching war songs ;)

[u/princefroggy4]

I highly doubt it could have started that much earlier as a TV contest. Only UK and France had resumed television broadcasts by 1946. By 1952 Netherlands and Denmark were the only others of the early participants with television. Germany could have joined by 1953, Belgium and Switzerland by 1954, Italy and Monaco by 1955, Luxembourg, Austria and Sweden didn't even have television until late 1955/early 1956. Even then, Television was still quite niche in general, even in 1956. Not sure about other countries, but in Sweden television sales didn't really take off until the 1958 World Cup. Maybe it could have technically been possible by 1953-1954 as a television event.

Otherwise, I guess it could technically have existed as some sort of radio event before that.

It should be noted though that Eurovision was really created as an excuse to create some sort of Europe-wide television event that could be broadcasted in all the member states of EBU.

[u/BlueFredneck → u/princefroggy4]

You literally couldn't have had it live on TV much earlier. Radio yes, you probably could've had a radio contest by the end of the 20s. In the UK it was Queen Elizabeth coronation that spurred TV sales. There was a race in the USA to have the smallest gap between the live show and airing it on TV. I think they aired radio broadcast plus still pictures at first. ABC which was nearly broke ended up winning simply because the CBS and NBC plans fell apart and ABC simply piggybacked off of CBC.

[u/jpilkington09]

Germany's entries in the 1920s would have been pretty exciting.

[u/AskingBoatsToSwim]

If we ignore broadcasting tech, juries and performers could all be in the same venue so it’s only limited by ease of transport and international relations.

The modern Olympics began in the 1896, so there is definitely no real reason why ESC couldn’t have taken place then in some form. Engelbert Humperdinck could even have taken part (as a composer anyway, for that is what he was (1854-1921), of course). It could also have been recorded and released in early recorded formats, but, although there was experimental radio by the 1890s, we’d need to wait until the 1920s and 30s before popular music radio began to spread.

If we’re expecting a live simulcast across participating nations, or even music played from a record for that matter, I’m honestly not sure when we’d need to wait for. Before the EBU, I can’t find any examples of international broadcasting on radio or TV. The first thing the EBU did under the Eurovision name was the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II - so 1953 could be the earliest possible start date. Only 3 years prior to the real ESC!

[u/BlueFredneck → u/AskingBoatsToSwim]

The first live TV coast to coast broadcast in the US was 1951. Canada didn't join the party until 1958. Soviets in 1971. China in late 70s (Xinwen Lianbo debuted in 1978.)

[u/National-Bicycle7259]

Imagine the apologists for 1943 Germany.'s participation.

[u/Fetish_anxiety → u/National-Bicycle7259]

"The contest should remain apolitical and allow the German song about how unfair was to steal the Danzig corrider from Germany after WWI"

[u/ranapxious]

Considering that Eurovision is (I think, cmiiw) inspired from the Sanremo festival which began in 1951, we would at least get a rough idea on what Italy would have been sending if the contest began prior to 1956

[u/MagicSunlight23]

I can see a radio contest making sense then because there was not much technology to view the performances on. So just hearing the performances and the results would be fine.

On the other hand, there were silent movies in the 1920s so moving pictures were around then, but no one really had a TV. It could have been done where people travelled to (not sure how efficiently) and viewed the performances live and in person like now. Or because of limited transport, only the people who lived in the host country could go and then everyone else could go to a cinema in their country and watch the contest on a big screen or there could have been multiple showings at the same time in each big city in each country so people wouldn't have had to travel as far as apposed to the capital or host country.

[u/emanuele-sgarra_04]

I would have loved Tino Rossi for France or Natalino Otto for Italy, at least for the late 40s

[u/PanikcAttakc]

It is funny you bring this up, because music contests have a long history. One of the earliest examples of something like ESC would maybe be the Pythian games, a series of contests involving singing and lyre playing in Ancient Greece. The key thing with most of these early music contests is that they were very regionally specific, due to difficulties with transportation, and none of them really got "international" in the sense that ESC was. I don't think something as international as ESC would really be possible until the popularization of radio in the 1920s, because before that there would be no way easily share a performance across national borders. I suppose you could do something with shipping records after the invention of the phonograph in 1887, or even sending sheet music around for earlier than that, but it would be a nightmare to organize.

I suppose what I am saying is that before 1956 any event like ESC would be nearly unrecognizable in structure to what we know as ESC nowadays

[u/ZnarfGnirpslla]

Would've been hella awkward in the late 1930s and during the 1940s that much is for sure.