The golden days of Eurovision

Not long now before the 2008 Eurovision Song Contest kicks off in beautiful Belgrade.
I've always been a big fan of the contest but would be the first to admit that the quality of songs has declined markedly in recent years.
As I wrote in The Guardian:

Hardcore Eurovision-sceptics will doubt it, but there was a time when the continent's annual music-fest did actually produce good music. The golden age of Eurovision - like the golden age of football, television sitcoms and most other things which really matter - was the 1970s.
The strength of 70s Eurovision was shown by the quality of the songs that didn't win. Italy's Gigliola Cinquetti would have romped home in any other decade with her beautiful ballad Si, but had the bad luck in 1974 to come up against a Swedish outfit called Abba. The 1975 contest was another classic, won by the Dutch group Teach-In, with Ding a Dong, arguably the best winning song of all time.

And of course, Ding a Dong was followed a year later by the classic 'Save Your Kisses for Me', a runaway winner for The Brotherhood of Man, and the biggest selling Eurovision hit single of all time.

And as a reminder of those glory days, above is real You Tube gem: a video featuring all the Song Contest winners from 1956-79. Enjoy!