Celebrating 70 Years of being United by Music with the release of two extra-special films
70 years ago, on 24 May 1956, artists representing seven broadcasters gathered at the Teatro Kursaal in Lugano, Switzerland, for a bold new experiment in live television and cultural collaboration: the very first Eurovision Song Contest.
In 2026, we celebrate the 70th anniversary of what has since grown to become the world’s largest live music event – a Contest that has united hundreds of millions of viewers through music, creativity and shared moments for seven decades. And to mark the occasion, we’ve released two very special pieces of film celebrating the Contest’s remarkable history.
1956’s inaugural winner has been restored
In collaboration with Swiss broadcaster RSI, part of SRG SSR, the EBU has digitally restored and remastered the only known surviving footage of the winning entry from the very first Eurovision Song Contest.
Shot by photographer Vincenzo Vicari, the footage captures Switzerland’s Lys Assia reprising her song Refrain on stage at the Teatro Kursaal in Lugano on 24 May 1956, giving a rare and precious glimpse into the beginnings of the Eurovision Song Contest.
The film negatives have been carefully preserved in the archives of RSI but have not been digitized since the 1990s. As technology has advanced majorly since then, the EBU approached RSI to have the negatives rescanned, graded and digitally restored in ultra-high definition (4K), allowing audiences to experience one of the Contest’s most historic moments with unprecedented clarity.
In addition, the Eurodex archive on eurovision.com has been updated with a collection of Vicari’s photographs of the 1956 Contest, provided by the historical archives of the City of Lugano and now viewable on the Participants page of Lugano 1956.
Watch every winning performance from the Contest’s 70-year history right here.
Über die Brücke gehn – A Celebration of Unity Across 70 Years
The second new release to mark the 70th anniversary is a specially produced tribute film celebrating seven decades of artists and audiences being truly United By Music.
Set to the original live performance of Germany’s 1986 Eurovision entry Über die Brücke gehn by Ingrid Peters, the film intercuts emotional moments of artists embracing on stage and backstage throughout history – from the earliest broadcasts of the 1950s and ’60s through to last week’s victory for Bulgaria’s DARA in Vienna.
The song’s title – Crossing the Bridge – and its lyrics about connection, hope and moving forward together resonate powerfully with the Eurovision Song Contest’s story and values today. Across changing decades, technologies and generations, the Contest has continued to build bridges between countries and cultures, artists and audiences, through the universal language of music.
The film uses the original performance of Über die Brücke gehn, courtesy of Norwegian broadcaster NRK, and culminates with scenes from the 70th Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna, where Bulgaria’s BNT celebrated its first-ever Eurovision victory, with the competition’s highest ever winning margin, bringing the Contest’s story full circle into a new era.
Relive the Grand Final of the 70th Eurovision Song Contest on YouTube.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.eurovision.com ’
