‘In what language do you like to sing best?’ Placing popular music in broadcasting in post-war Europe

Abstract

The longest-running and best-known Europe-wide broadcast, the Eurovision Song Contest, is devoted to popular music, but it is not on radio, the medium that would seem most suited to music, but television. By contrast, it has now mostly been forgotten that a similar show featuring pop records, called European Pop Jury ran for nearly two decades starting in the mid-1960s. This article compares, contrasts and above all contextualises these two programmes as it traces the paths of popular music through European broadcasting. In so doing, it highlights the technical, institutional and discursive constellations that have allowed, but also limited, the circulation of popular music over European borders. It thus maps not just the creation, but also the fragmentation of technological and cultural spaces in Europe. It points ultimately to both top-down and bottom-up formations of ‘Europeanisation’ understood as acts of appropriation and translation of music over borders.

Keywords:

• popular music
• radio
• television
• Eurovision Song Contest
• Americanisation
• Europeanisation
• broadcasting history

Acknowledgements

Thanks to European Broadcasting Union for access to their archive, as well as Raina Konstantinova and Pierre-Yves Triboulet for their insights into European radio. I am also grateful to colleagues on the TIE project in Eindhoven, especially Suzanne Lommers, and the TRANS project, particularly Andreas Fickers and Christian Henrich-Franke, as well as to Frank Bösch for useful comments on an early draft of this article, and to Klaus Nathaus for expert guidance all along the way. Some of the work here was completed during my time as a fellow at the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study (NIAS). I am grateful for their help and support.

Notes

^1.Björnberg, “Return to Ethnicity,” 15.

^2.Frith, “Look! Hear!,” 279.

^3.Bourdon, “Unhappy Engineers,” 266.

^4.Sandvoss, “On the Couch with Europe,” 204.

^5. See Fickers and Lommers, “Eventing Europe”; Lommers, Europe – On Air; Pajala, “Intervision.” Currently online at: http://www2.fb1.uni-siegen.de/airy-curtain/pajala.pdf.

^6. The first broadcast is held in the BBC sound archives, sound document CD 008901.

^7. Besides a wide range of studies that look at individual countries, books that attempt to deal with Europe as a whole include Pells, Not Like Us; Crnkovic and Ramet, Kazaaam!; Grazia, Irresistible Empire; Schildt and Siegfried, Between Marx and Coca-Cola.

^8.Wicke, “Music, Dissidence, Revolution, and Commerce.”

^9.Siefert, “Twentieth Century,” 167–8.

^10. Ibid., 167.

^11. I view the spaces of popular music here as what Andrew Barry describes as “technological zones”. He defines such zones as spaces where knowledge and material are harmonised to allow and regulate circulation. Barry, Political Machines.

^12.Dussel, Hörfunk in Deutschland; Kemppainen, “Pirates.”

^13.Hilmes, Network Nations; Johns, Death of a Pirate, 13–69; Johns, Piracy, ch. 13; Street, Crossing the Ether; Lommers, Europe – On Air; Spohrer, “Ruling”; Bourdon, “Old and New Ghosts.”

^14. See Kemppainen, “Pirates.” Wolfgang Rumpf goes so far as to speak of a “pop-taboo” at Germany's public-service broadcasters, which closer research does not substantiate. Rumpf, Music in the Air; compare Hilgert, “Auf der Suche.”

^15.Siefert, “Twentieth Century,” 186 n. 3.

^16. On the history and mission of the EBU see Zeller, EBU; Degenhardt and Strautz, Auf der Suche. For a short overview see Henrich-Franke, “European Broadcasting Union.”

^17. Arno Huth, 1937, cited in Fickers and Lommers, “Eventing Europe,” 227. The power of radio transmitters increased exponentially around 1929, a few years after the first international agreements. Lommers, Europe – On Air, 94.

^18.Lommers, Europe – On Air, 250.

^19.Wormbs, “Technology-Dependent Commons.”

^20.Lommers, Europe – On Air, ch. 6.

^21.Johns, Death of a Pirate, 40ff.; Street, Crossing the Ether, 150.

^22.Street, Crossing the Ether, 138ff.

^23.Spohrer, “Ruling,” 95ff.

^24.Douglas, Listening In.

^25.Fickers, “Radio Station Scale”; Fickers, “Design als “mediating Interface”.”

^26.Briggs, The War of Words; Street, Crossing the Ether, 190–2; Falkenberg, Radiohören, 108–27.

^27.Bergmeier, Hitler's Airwaves; Currid, National Acoustics.

^28.Falkenberg, Radiohören.

^29.Erenberg, “Broadcasting Freedom.”

^30. Such co-ordinated exchange, which allows international circulation of programmes whilst not undermining the state, is highlighted by Ernest Eugster as a key reason for the organizations” success in Cold War Europe. Eugster, Television Programming, 2.

^31.Craig, “Medium-Wave,” 123–4.

^32. Ibid.; Henrich-Franke, “Property Rights”; Schwoch, Global TV, 34.

^33.Spohrer, “Ruling,” 369ff.

^34. BFN became British Forces Broadcasting Service (BFBS) in 1964.

^35.Berland, “Radio Space and Industrial Time,” 180.

^36.Street, Crossing the Ether, 189–94.

^37.Dussel, “Welle der Freude.”

^38. “The present position and perspectives of VHF sound broadcasting in Europe,” August, 1955, p. 1. Historical Archive EBU, Tech Comm 3068-E.

^39. Quoted in Chapman, Selling the Sixties, 21.

^40.Von Zahn, “Schallplattenkrieg,” 90–2; Dussel, Hörfunk in Deutschland, 363ff.

^41. In Germany, the first “record war” over the amount of broadcasting time the radio stations were allowed – 60 h per month – was in 1931. Schumacher, “Programmstruktur,” 414.

^42.Chapman, Selling the Sixties, 21–3.

^43. Sound Broadcasting Committee, meeting of the Bureau, 8 May 1965, 10; von Zahn, “Schallplattenkrieg.”

^44. “Wer Ist Tu,” Der Spiegel, 2 October 1963: 95–110.

^45.Nathaus, “Turning Values into Revenue.”

^46.Nichols, Radio Luxembourg, 71ff.

^47.Craig, “American Forces,” 316.

^48. As so often, US record companies were of two minds about supplying their records for (free) airplay in places where they hoped to sell records. Lou Frankel, “Commercials in the E.T.O.,” Billboard 12 May 1945: 4. Records were donated under the premise that AFN did address their “native” audiences. Falkenberg, Radiohören, 208; Craig, “American Forces,” 316.

^49. Roughly half of the station's programming was popular music, at least since the mid-1950s. See Craig, “American Forces,” 310.

^50.Chapman, Selling the Sixties, 91–2; Skues, Pop Went the Pirates II, 34.

^51.Wald, How the Beatles Destroyed Rock “n” Roll, 84ff.

^52.Nichols, Radio Luxembourg.

^53. See “Tijd voor Teenagers – Beeld en geluid Wiki.” http://www.beeldengeluidwiki.nl/index.php/Tijd_voor_teenagers [Accessed 11 August 2012]; de Kloet, “Tijd voor Teenagers.”

^54. The five countries were Great Britain, France, Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands.

^55.Fickers, “Eventing Europe.”

^56.Degenhardt and Strautz, Auf der Suche.

^57. Speech of Cecil McGivern at the Radio Industries Club Luncheon, London, 22 April 1954. Cited in: Fickers and Lommers, “Eventing Europe.”

^58. In the 1958 ESC, a technical failure required one entry to reappear on stage, which meant that someone had to come on stage and explain this occurrence to the studio audience. In the Netherlands, as the presenter Hannie Lips walked out on stage, the voice-over announcer Siebe van der Zee suddenly pondered aloud “I wonder what language she will speak?.” See Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision, Document 157892.

^59. This is also a tension that plagued transnational live events in the 1930s. See Lommers, Europe – On Air, 269.

^60.Pajala, “Intervision.”

^61.Bergfelder, International Adventures, 44.

^62. Ibid., 45.

^63. The “toddler's truce” was a voluntary break in television programming observed by both the BBC and the commercial ITV between 6:00 and 7:00pm, so young children could be fed and put to bed without distraction. The name 6.5 Special referred to the start of the programme, which was at 6:05pm.

^64.Wicke, “Music, Dissidence, Revolution, and Commerce,” 115–16. Cloonan similarly argues for the importance of television in generating British pop stardom. Cloonan, “Production of English Rock and Roll,” 278.

^65.Fickers, “Eventing Europe,” 411. An excerpt from this programme – though not featuring Kraus – can be found online at the French Institut national de l'audiovisuel: http://www.ina.fr/art-et-culture/arts-du-spectacle/video/CPF86600645/age-tendre-et-tete-de-bois-emission-du-13-avril-1963.fr.html [Accessed 20 July 2012].

^66. See Badenoch, “Translating ‘Liebeskummer’.” The show is online at the European television history portal EUScreen: http://www.euscreen.eu/play.jsp?id=eus_706888d1273d4f4899305d790477997d. Malmkvist competed for Sweden in 1960 and for Germany in 1969.

^67. Liliane St. Pierre also went on to compete for Belgium at the ESC in 1987 with the song Soldiers of Love.

^68.Dussel, “Triumph of English-Language Pop,” 131.

^69.Fickers, “Anfänge des kommerziellen Rundfunks.”

^70. On the Courier, see Nelson, War of the Black Heavens, 59; On Mercur, see Norgaard, “When Mercury Got Wings.”

^71. EBU, Admin Council meeting, May 1960, EBU Archive (Geneva) EBU CA PV 1957-1960, CA/597, p. 16.

^72.Dussel, “Triumph of English-Language Pop,” 136.

^73.Chapman, Selling the Sixties.

^74. For a critical view see above all Robert Chapman's thorough and sceptical history, Selling the Sixties, as well as Kok, Dit was Veronica and Badenoch, “Between Rock and Roll.”

^75.Weber, Versprechen mobiler Freiheit, 109; Wicke, “Music, Dissidence, Revolution, and Commerce,” 115.

^76.Chapman, Selling the Sixties, 49.

^77. Ibid., 86–7.

^78.Kemppainen, “Pirates”; Franzén, “Melodiradio.”

^79.Kemppainen, “Pirates,” 131.

^80.Franzén, “Melodiradio,” 63.

^81. For a more complete history of this committee, see Badenoch, “Europäische Wiedergeburt.”

^82. On the ARD system see Kursawe, Vom Leitmedium zum Begleitmedium, 78; von Zahn, “Schallplattenkrieg,” 98.

^83. My survey of the Radio Program Committee's minutes during the 1960s sees them largely debating new collaborative projects and modes of exchange. The latter, as in discussion of how and whether to use the EBU's permanent sound network for programme exchange, did of course have an economic component to it. See Sound Broadcasting Program Committee, Study Group of Experts on Light Music, 27-28 January 1966. Appendix 1. EBU Archive (Geneva). EBU OA3280 RadCom 80, p. 12.

^84.Eugster, Television Programming, 71.

^85. Sound Broadcasting Committee, meeting of the Bureau, 8 May 1965, 10. EBU Archive (Geneva). EBU OA3162 RadCom 47.

^86.Dussel, Hörfunk in Deutschland, 371ff.; von Zahn, “Schallplattenkrieg.”

^87. Report of the Sound Broadcasting Program Committee, Stockholm Oct 1966 to the Administrative Council Meeting 18–19 November 1966, 16. EBU Archive (Geneva). EBU OA3411 CA856 RadCom 114. The concept of a “screening session” was also borrowed from the Television Program Committee, which had started a short time before. See Henrich-Franke, “EBU Screening Sessions.”

^88. Eg. Report of the Sound Broadcasting Committee to the ordinary session of the Radio Program Committee, December 1974. EBU Archive (Geneva) EBU OA5035 RadCom 434.

^89. Unlike the programme committee, the technical and legal departments of the EBU reacted swiftly to the appearance of non-national broadcasters.

^90. Sound Broadcasting Program Committee, Study Group of Experts on Light Music, 27–28 January 1966. Appendix 1. EBU Archive (Geneva). EBU OA3280 RadCom 80.

^91. Sound Broadcasting Committee, meeting of the Bureau, 8 May 1965, 9. EBU Archive (Geneva). EBU OA3162 RadCom 47.

^92. Report of the Sound Broadcasting Committee to the EBU Administrative Council Meeting, 18–19 November 1966, 16. EBU Archive (Geneva). EBU OA3411 CA856 RadCom 114.

^93. Sound Broadcasting Program Committee, meeting of the Bureau, Brussels 20–21 January 1965, 2. EBU Archive (Geneva) EBU OA 3099 RadCom 20.

^94. Sound Broadcasting Program Committee, Study Group of Experts on Light Music 26, 29 February 1965, 7. EBU Archive (Geneva). EBU Box RC4 OA 3083 RadCom 19.

^95. Sound Broadcasting Program Committee, Study Group of Experts on Light Music 16–17 June 1966, 7. EBU Archive (Geneva). EBU OA3370 RadCom 101.

^96. BBC sound document CD 008901; see also Paulu, Radio and Television, 139–40.

^97. Sound Broadcasting Program Committee, Study Group of Experts on Light Music, 27–28 January 1966, 5. EBU Archive (Geneva). EBU OA3280 RadCom 80 (my emphasis).

^98. Sound Broadcasting Program Committee, Study Group of Experts on Serious Music 26–27 January 1965, 2. EBU Archive (Geneva) EBU OA 3082 RadCom 18. While Mertens was head of the light-music study group, he was also a member of the serious-music study group. His counterpart from the serious-music group, Giulio Razzi, also sat on the light-music study group – and had in fact been the inventor of the San Remo festival.

^99.Von Zahn, “Schallplattenkrieg,” 98; Kemppainen, “Pirates,” 131; “Festivals.” Eurosonic. http://www.eurosonic.net/?page_id=83 [Accessed 11 August 2012].

^100.Elsaesser, European Cinema, 82–107.

^101.Siefert, “Twentieth Century,” 184. The musicologist Brian Currid has similarly shown how the German Schlager stood in problematical relation to the nation in the 1920s and 1930. Currid, National Acoustics, 72ff.

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Alexander Badenoch

Alexander Badenoch is a postdoc at University Paris IV Sorbonne on the LABEX ‘Écrire une nouvelle histoire de l'Europe’ (EHNE) project. He received his PhD in Modern Languages from the University of Southampton. He was postdoc at the Technical University Eindhoven, Lecturer in Media and Cultural studies at Utrecht University, and recently visiting fellow at the Zentrum für Zeithistorische Forschung in Potsdam. He is the author of Voices in Ruins: West German Radio Across the 1945 Divide (2008), and most recently co-editor of Airy Curtains in the European Ether: Broadcasting and the Cold War (2013) and the online exhibit, Inventing Europe (www.inventingeurope.eu).