culture


Shine like a star

Have you heard of winter-depression? Are you infected too? I can get quite down if the days are so short as they are right now. No wonder that the celebration of the winter solstice is so important in most Nordic cultures. It’s the start of the days getting longer again. Many Christmas customs have their origin in the celebration of winter solstice in Nordic countries. Pines and pine branches stand for the hope of everything getting green again in spring. […]


Humor and business

It’s amazing, how serious we take business. Some like it if you lighten the burden with humor, others don’t. Still, I’m convinced that humor is the best way to lighten up a tense situation, to disarm a conflict and to treat yourself not too seriously. And that being said by someone who grew up in Germany 😉 Today I got a mail from a friend and colleague, he’s a booking agent too. He was offering a combination of three different […]


Music and humor

“Only Americans can combine those two”, said a visitor last weekend after the show of the American singer-songwriter Elliott Murphy. It was a great show. He knows how to combine great music and humor. And somehow the music gets better too by adding humor. But is it true, that only Americans can do it? What’s the secret? Humor obviously helps you as artist to connect to the audience, to involve them. And yes, there are huge cultural differences regarding humor. […]


Making a choice

As booking agent I get many requests from artists, managers, labels etc. to start working for them and their artists. Usually it starts with an e-mail that I read and I listen to the link with music. If I like the music and the story behind it, I’ll react to the request and ask for an album. Last month I listened to an album of a female singer. The albums intrigued me, but somehow it didn’t fit. When the manager […]


Art and craft 1

On Wikipedia I found the most simple definition of an artist: a person who creates art. And when art originally just meant ‘skill’ or ‘craft’, it’s now used as an abbreviation for creative art or fine arts. ‘Creating’ is the key here. And a more contemporary definition adds the concept of ‘imagination’: art is “the use of skill and imagination in the creation of aesthetic objects, environments, or experiences that can be shared with others.” This also marks the difference […]