It's the biggest celebration of music in the world, last year pulling in a global audience of more than 180 million viewers but when, in 1972, the Eurovision Song Contest came to Edinburgh, it was a very different event.
There were a few “tra-la-las”, several acoustic guitars, long-haired chaps dressed up in bow ties and – the height of fashion – a very brown set. Tonight, millions will tune into an outrageous glitterfest of Eurovision campness, with pyrotechnics, occasional bum notes, forgettable ballads and, for a few performers, that most unwelcome of guests, a positive Covid-19 test. There will be the usual technical challenges, laborious voting and a spirited UK performance of Embers by James Newman, shot down by political differences and a whiff of anti-Brexit hostilities. All very different 50 years ago, when a victory for the tiny principality of Monaco sparked an unusual sequence of events that eventually led to Eurovision rolling into Edinburgh’s Usher Hall.