In Your Eyes: Eurovision in a Cork Village

MAY 15 1993 · 12:15

Niamh Kavanagh · "In Your Eyes" · Ireland · 1993 Placement: 1st · Score: 187 · Language: English · Composers: Jimmy Walsh · Venue: Green Glens Arena · Host: Millstreet, Ireland · Type: winner · Broadcast: color crt On May 15, 1993, in Millstreet — a village of roughly 1,500 people in County Cork whose equestrian arena had been converted at considerable logistical expense into a Eurovision venue — an Irish singer named Niamh Kavanagh took the stage fourteenth on the running order and delivered a ballad called 'In Your Eyes,' written by Jimmy Walsh. Kavanagh, whose voice had first come to wide attention through her vocal work on the 1991 film 'The Commitments,' sang with a controlled, emotionally steady delivery that built over the song's four and a half minutes into a full-throated chorus. The voting ran close until the end; the final vote — from the last-announcing country — pushed Ireland past the United Kingdom's entry, 'Better the Devil You Know' by Sonia, to a record 187 points. Ireland had won Eurovision for the second year in a row, following Linda Martin's 1992 victory, and the tiny Cork village that had hosted the contest erupted. The Millstreet edition had been widely mocked in pre-contest European coverage — a rural village was considered an implausible venue for what was by 1993 a production with several-hundred-person traveling crews. The broadcast had been flawless. The bet had paid off. And Ireland was suddenly on a winning streak that would have no precedent. Context Eurovision 1993 was the contest's first edition after the fall of the Iron Curtain in which multiple post-Soviet and former-Yugoslav states sought to join, prompting the introduction of a new pre-qualifying round — 'Kvalifikacija za Millstreet' — through which Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, and Slovenia entered the main contest. Ireland had won Eurovision 1992 in Malmö with Linda Martin's 'Why Me' and was the host by rotation. RTÉ's choice of Millstreet was driven partly by cost and partly by entrepreneur Noel C. Duggan, who had offered the Green Glens Arena — his own equestrian venue — as a no-rent host site. The gamble had been public and nervous-making in Irish media. Niamh Kavanagh's selection came via Ireland's national selection; 'In Your Eyes' was a Jimmy Walsh composition written specifically for the Eurovision cycle. Legacy Ireland's 1993 win was the second of what became a record-setting three consecutive Eurovision victories (1992, 1993, 1994) and, across the decade, the first of an extraordinary 1990s Irish dominance that would see Ireland win four of five years between 1992 and 1996. 'In Your Eyes' was the best-selling single in Ireland in 1993 and charted at 24 in the UK. Niamh Kavanagh returned to Eurovision as Ireland's entrant in 2010 with 'It's for You,' placing 23rd in a much-changed contest landscape. The Millstreet edition is often cited as evidence that Eurovision's production demands had not yet crossed the threshold beyond which only major-city venues were viable — by the 2000s, no equivalent rural host would be financially or logistically possible. The Green Glens Arena still stands. Mythology Millstreet is often described as having a population of several hundred; it was closer to 1,500 at the time of hosting. The contest's 187-point total is sometimes cited as the all-time points record; it was the record at the time but has been surpassed many times since Eurovision's scoring expansion in the 2010s. Niamh Kavanagh is occasionally described as having been already a major pop star before Eurovision; she was primarily known for session work and 'The Commitments' soundtrack prior to 1993.