LUXEMBOURG – The Eurovision Song Contest 1984, the 29th event of its kind, was held on 5 May 1984 in Luxembourg. The presenter, Désirée Nosbusch, only 19 years old at the time, hosted the show in a lax manner, which was quite unusual for the show at the time.
She manifested her fluency in four languages by switching between a strong transatlantic English, French, German and Luxembourgish in the course of talking, often in the same sentence.
Sweden’s the Herreys were the winners of this contest with the song, “Diggi-Loo Diggi-Ley”. This was the Nordic country’s second win, and the first song performed in Swedish. The previous Swedish winner, ABBA, ten years ago had performed their song “Waterloo” in English.
Richard and Luis Herrey became the first teenage males to win Eurovision and remain the youngest ever male winners, being 19 years and 260 days and 18 years and 184 days of age respectively.
Israel withdrew from the contest due to Yom Hazikaron (Day of Remembrance for the Fallen Soldiers of Israel and Victims of Terrorism) being commemorated on the same date. Iceland was going to participate but withdrew due to lack of financial support.
1984 is also a notable for the audible booing that could be heard from the audience, particularly at the end of the UK’s performance. It was said that the booing was due to English football hooligans having rioted in Luxembourg in November 1983 after being knocked out of the UEFA European Football Championship.
However, the song itself managed a pretty good showing, reaching seventh place.
