OTI Festival 1981


The OTI Festival 1981 was the 10th edition of the OTI Festival, held on 5 December 1981 at the National Auditorium in Mexico City, Mexico, and presented by Raúl Velasco. It was organised by the Organización de Televisión Iberoamericana and host broadcaster Televisa.
Broadcasters from twenty-one countries participated in the festival. The winner was the song "Latino" performed by representing Spain; with "Súbete a mi nube" by Marianella representing Argentina placing second; and "Lo que pasó, pasó " by Yoshio representing Mexico and "Cuando fuiste mujer" by Aldo Matta representing the United States both placing third.

Location

The Organización de Televisión Iberoamericana designated Televisa as the host broadcaster for the 10th edition of the OTI Festival. Televisa staged the event in Mexico City. The venue selected was the National Auditorium, which was the most important entertainment venue in the country. It was opened in 1952 and was designed by Pedro Ramírez Vázquez and Gonzalo Ramírez del Sordo. In 1989, the auditorium underwent a complete renovation, of which only the stands on the first two floors were preserved.
The participating delegations were accommodated at Hotel Chapultepec.

Participants

Broadcasters from twenty-one countries participated in this edition of the OTI festival. The OTI members, public or private broadcasters from Spain, Portugal, and nineteen Spanish and Portuguese speaking countries of Ibero-America signed up for the festival. Except for Bolivia and the Dominican Republic, all other countries that participated in the previous edition returned.
Some of the participating broadcasters, such as those representing Chile, Mexico, the Netherlands Antilles, and the United States, selected their entries through their regular national televised competitions. Other broadcasters decided to select their entry internally.
Five performing artists had previously represented the same country in previous editions: Eduardo Fuentes had represented El Salvador in 1975, Gladys Mercado had represented Peru in 1975, Florcita Motuda had represented Chile in 1978, Roger Barés had represented Panama in 1978, and José Cid had represented Portugal in 1979.
CountryBroadcasterArtistSongLanguageSongwriterConductor
Argentina|1861lang\|es|Súbete a mi nube|i=nohlist|Chico Novarro|

Festival overview

The festival was held on Saturday 5 December 1981, beginning at 17:00 CST. It was presented by Raúl Velasco, who had previously presented the festival in 1974 and 1976.
The winner was the song "Latino" performed by representing Spain; with "Súbete a mi nube" by Marianella representing Argentina placing second; and "Lo que pasó, pasó " by Yoshio representing Mexico and "Cuando fuiste mujer" by Aldo Matta representing the United States both placing third. There was one trophy designed by Francisco Moyao for each of the first three places. The first prize trophy was delivered by Guillermo Cañedo, president of OTI, and Alejandro Sada, vice-president of Televisa; the second prize trophy by Nicanor González, president of the OTI programs committee; and the third prize trophy by Alfredo Escobar, vice-president of the OTI programs committee. The festival ended with a reprise of the winning entry.
CountryArtistSongPointsResult
1Portugallang\|pt|Uma lágrima|i=no

Spokespersons

Each participating broadcaster appointed a spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the points for their respective jury in ascending order. Known spokespersons at the 1981 festival are listed below.

Detailed voting results

Each participating broadcaster assembled a national jury located in its respective country. Each jury awarded 5 points its favourite song, 4 points to the second favourite, and then between 3 and 1 points for the third- to fifth-favourite songs, except for the entry representing its own country. Each participating broadcaster had also a delegate present in the hall to stand in for its jury if it was not receiving the event live, or in case of communication failure during the broadcast or voting. In the event of a tie for first place, the stand-in delegates from the countries not affected by the tie would vote to select the winning song from among the tied ones.
The point count was displayed on a scoreboard placed to the left of the stage. All the countries gave their votes remotely by telephone, except for those that used the stand-in delegates, which included Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Netherlands Antilles, and Uruguay.

Broadcast

The festival was broadcast in the 21 participating countries, where the corresponding OTI member broadcasters relayed the contest through their networks after receiving it live via satellite.
Known details on the broadcasts of the festival in each country, including the specific broadcasting stations and commentators are shown in the tables below.