Eurovision Song Contest 1984
The Eurovision Song Contest 1984 was the 29th edition of the Eurovision Song Contest, held on 5 May 1984 at the Grand Théâtre de Luxembourg in Luxembourg City, Luxembourg, and presented by Désirée Nosbusch. It was organised by the European Broadcasting Union and host broadcaster RTL Group, who staged the event after winning the for with the song "Si la vie est cadeau" by Corinne Hermès. Nosbusch, who was 19 years old, remains the youngest person to have hosted the contest as of 2025.
Broadcasters from nineteen countries participated in the contest, with returning after a one-year absence, and and, which had participated in the previous year's event, declining to enter. The winner was with the song "Diggi-Loo Diggi-Ley", composed by Torgny Söderberg, written by Britt Lindeborg and performed by the group Herreys. This was Sweden's second contest victory, coming ten years after ABBA's win in the. Ireland finished as runner-up, and placed third and fourth, respectively, and and tied for fifth place.
Location
Participants
Entries from a total of 19 countries participated in the event. returned to the contest after a one-year absence, however and decided not to participate. The Israel Broadcasting Authority declined to enter as the date of the contest coincided with Yom HaZikaron, while the Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation, which had originally planned to participate in the contest, reportedly withdrew as the quality of the songs submitted for consideration was deemed to be of too low a quality.A number of the participating artists in this year's event had previously competed in past editions of the contest. Mary Roos had finished third for and made a second appearance for the country in 1984; Izolda Barudžija, who had been a member of the group Aska that represented, participated again this year alongside Vlado Kalember; Kit Rolfe, lead singer of Belle and the Devotions, had previously performed as a backing vocalist for the, and Gary Lux, who had represented as a member of the group Westend, returned as a backing vocalist for the Austrian singer Anita.
| Country | Broadcaster | Artist | Song | Language | Songwriter | Conductor |
| ORF | Anita | "Einfach weg" | German | Richard Oesterreicher | ||
| RTBF | Jacques Zegers | "Avanti la vie" | French | |||
| CyBC | Andy Paul | "Anna Mari-Elena" | Greek | Andy Paul | Pierre Cao | |
| DR | Hot Eyes | "Det' lige det" | Danish | |||
| YLE | Kirka | "Hengaillaan" | Finnish | Ossi Runne | ||
| France 2 | Annick Thoumazeau | "Autant d'amoureux que d'étoiles" | French | François Rauber | ||
| BR | Mary Roos | "Aufrecht geh'n" | German | Pierre Cao | ||
| RTÉ | Linda Martin | "Terminal 3" | English | Johnny Logan | Noel Kelehan | |
| RAI | Alice and Franco Battiato | "I treni di Tozeur" | Italian | Giusto Pio | ||
| CLT | Sophie Carle | "100% d'amour" | French | Pascal Stive | ||
| NOS | Maribelle | "Ik hou van jou" | Dutch | Rogier van Otterloo | ||
| NRK | Dollie de Luxe | "Lenge leve livet" | Norwegian | Sigurd Jansen | ||
| RTP | Maria Guinot | "Silêncio e tanta gente" | Portuguese | Maria Guinot | ||
| TVE | Bravo | "Lady, Lady" | Spanish | Eddy Guerin | ||
| SVT | Herreys | "Diggi-Loo Diggi-Ley" | Swedish | Curt-Eric Holmquist | ||
| SRG SSR | "Welche Farbe hat der Sonnenschein" | German | Mario Robbiani | |||
| TRT | Beş Yıl Önce, On Yıl Sonra | "Halay" | Turkish | Selçuk Başar | ||
| BBC | Belle and the Devotions | "Love Games" | English | John Coleman | ||
| JRT | Ida and Vlado | "Ciao, amore" | Serbo-Croatian |
Production and format
The Eurovision Song Contest 1984 was produced by the Luxembourgish public broadcaster RTL Group. Ray van Cant served as executive producer, served as producer, René Steichen served as director, served as designer, and Pierre Cao served as musical director, leading the orchestra. A separate musical director could be nominated by each participating delegation to lead the orchestra during its country's performance, with the host musical director also available to conduct for those countries which did not nominate their own conductor. On behalf of the European Broadcasting Union, the event was overseen by Frank Naef as scrutineer. The overall costs to organise the event were around 35 million Luxembourgish francs.Each participating broadcaster submitted one song, which was required to be no longer than three minutes in duration and performed in the language, or one of the languages, of the country which it represented. A maximum of six performers were allowed on stage during each country's performance. Each entry could utilise all or part of the live orchestra and could use instrumental-only backing tracks, however any backing tracks used could only include the sound of instruments featured on stage being mimed by the performers.
The results of the 1984 contest were determined through the same scoring system as had first been introduced in : each country awarded twelve points to its favourite entry, followed by ten points to its second favourite, and then awarded points in decreasing value from eight to one for the remaining songs which featured in the country's top ten, with countries unable to vote for their own entry. The points awarded by each country were determined by an assembled jury of 11 individuals, who were all required to be members of the public with no connection to the music industry, with a recommendation that there should be a balance between the sexes and that half should be under 25 years old. Each jury member voted in secret and awarded between one and five votes to each participating song, excluding that from their own country and with no abstentions permitted. The votes of each member were collected following the country's performance and then tallied by the non-voting jury chairperson to determine the points to be awarded. In any cases where two or more songs in the top ten received the same number of votes, a show of hands by all jury members was used to determine the final placing.
Rehearsals for the participating artists began on 30 April 1984. Two technical rehearsals were conducted for each participating delegation in the week approaching the contest, with countries rehearsing in the order in which they would perform. The first rehearsals of 40 minutes were held on 30 April and 1 May 1984, followed by a press conference for each delegation and the accredited press. Each country's second rehearsals were held on 2 and 3 May and lasted 20 minutes total. Three dress rehearsals were held with all artists, two held in the afternoon and evening of 4 May and one final rehearsal in the afternoon of 5 May, with an invited audience present for the second dress rehearsal.
Dutch designer Roland de Groot was in charge of the set design of the contest for the fourth time, having previously done so,, and, the three previous contests staged in the Netherlands. For the 1984 contest, de Groot's design centred around various shapes which were suspended over the performance area on a series of pulleys and which could be moved around the stage in between the competing acts; this allowed for different backdrops to be created for each entry. Each entry was preceded by a video postcard which served as an introduction to that country, as well as creating a transition between entries to allow stage crew to make changes on stage. The postcards for the 1984 contest featured a troupe of actors referred to during the contest as "the Tourists", and focused on the various cultural stereotypes of each of the competing countries and portrayed these a humorous context, often with heavy use of computer animation.
Contest overview
The contest was held on 5 May 1984, beginning at 21:00 and lasting 2 hours and 12 minutes. The event was presented by the Luxembourgish television presenter and actress Désirée Nosbusch, who compèred the contest in French, German, Luxembourgish, and English; at 19 years old, Nosbusch remains the youngest individual to have hosted the Eurovision Song Contest as of 2024. Among the invited guests present in the audience was Prince Henri, then heir to the Luxembourger throne. The contest's interval act featured a performance by the Prague Theatre of Illuminated Drawings. The medallions awarded to the winners were presented by the previous year's winning artist Corinne Hermès.The 1984 contest featured one of the first instances of booing to be heard at the Eurovision Song Contest, which occurred immediately after the UK's entry. Various reasons for the booing have been proposed: these include being a response to football hooliganism which occurred in Luxembourg by English football fans during the qualifying stage of the 1984 European Championship, the use of off-stage backing vocalists during the UK's performance which gave an impression that members of Belle and the Devotions were lip syncing, and allegations that their song, "Love Games", which was heavily inspired by 1960s Motown tracks, had plagiarised previous tracks by the Supremes.
The winner was represented by the song "Diggi-Loo Diggi-Ley", composed by Torgny Söderberg, written by Britt Lindeborg and performed by Herreys, comprising brothers Per, Richard and Louis Herrey. It was Sweden's second contest win, ten years after ABBA's victory in. It was also the thirdand, as of 2025, lasttime that the winning entry was the first to be performed, following the and. During the traditional winner's reprise performance, the group sung part of the winning song in English, with lyrics written by Per Herrey.
| Country | Artist | Song | Points | Place | |
| 1 | Herreys | "Diggi-Loo Diggi-Ley" | 145 | 1 | |
| 2 | "100% d'amour" | 39 | 10 | ||
| 3 | "Autant d'amoureux que d'étoiles" | 61 | 8 | ||
| 4 | Bravo | "Lady, Lady" | 106 | 3 | |
| 5 | Dollie de Luxe | "Lenge leve livet" | 29 | 17 | |
| 6 | Belle and the Devotions | "Love Games" | 63 | 7 | |
| 7 | "Anna Maria-Lena" | 31 | 15 | ||
| 8 | "Avanti la vie" | 70 | 5 | ||
| 9 | "Terminal 3" | 137 | 2 | ||
| 10 | Hot Eyes | "Det' lige det" | 101 | 4 | |
| 11 | Maribelle | "Ik hou van jou" | 34 | 13 | |
| 12 | Ida and Vlado | "Ciao, amore" | 26 | 18 | |
| 13 | Anita | "Einfach weg" | 5 | 19 | |
| 14 | "Aufrecht geh'n" | 34 | 13 | ||
| 15 | Beş Yıl Önce, On Yıl Sonra | "Halay" | 37 | 12 | |
| 16 | Kirka | "Hengaillaan" | 46 | 9 | |
| 17 | "Welche Farbe hat der Sonnenschein" | 30 | 16 | ||
| 18 | Alice and Franco Battiato | "I treni di Tozeur" | 70 | 5 | |
| 19 | "Silêncio e tanta gente" | 38 | 11 |