Who was/is Ekkes Frank ? - CDs, Vinyl LPs, DVD and more
Ekkes Frank
"I see singer-songwriting as a way of bringing the views I have on political developments to the people." (Ekkes Frank)
Born in Heidelberg in 1939, the trained lawyer - "Kurt Tucholsky was also a lawyer or Ludwig Thoma ..." - had already worked for several years as a freelance author for radio and television before appearing publicly as a singer-songwriter for the first time in 1973. Growing up in a petty bourgeois home, Ekkehard 'Ekkes' Frank made his first political experiences with the 'Spiegel' affair in 1962, and "then the student riots came and my consciousness developed so slowly". This led Frank, in his years as a singer-songwriter, to always being involved in movements - the youth centre movement, the prohibition of jobs and the peace movement.
In 1973 Frank wrote in a letter to 'Sing In' about himself and his first songs: "I was one of the 'Stichlingen', Munich's last student cabaret so far. What cannot be formulated in the song, I 'pour' into satires, printed e.g. in the 'Deutsche Volkszeitung'. ... my songs are very different in content (in quality, of course) according to their origin. On the other hand, they all come from the same basic attitude ... [...] ... I also strive for the 'nuances', of which Degenhardt probably only thought for a while that they were 'cramps in the class struggle'; and: I try to be cheerful, also entertaining, because in it alone I am not yet able to discover any betrayal of the class viewpoint. ... there's no record, pläne has shown some interest - but at the moment this refers more to my 'Ma(r)x und Engels' [meaning is the publication of the same name, 'Ma(r)x und Engels - Eine fortgesetztriebene Zeitgeschichte in (bis jetzt) acht Streichen', Hamburg, 1971; author's note]. - the songs are too diffuse for them, as far as they even know them ..." A year later his 'Songs to Touch' appeared on ... pläne.
The song Tagesschau from this first LP is a satirical commentary on the way television prepares information in the 'Tagesschau'. "I can't remember exactly when it was. Anyway I went to Nuremberg for a gig and needed an encore, just in case ... At a rest stop I remembered the first line: 'Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, this is German Television with the 'Tagesschau'. I wrote that song pretty much in one go. Had also enough experience, also from the internal conditions as an editor at the SDR television. In those years, television experienced quite an upswing, color television, ZDF, the third programs. And the 'Tagesschau', the oldest news programme on TV, had an almost sacrosanct status, it was, so to speak, ex cathedra what was proclaimed to the people, the congregation. To scratch at it a little bit, to relativize the form and the contents a little bit - that was my intention with this song. The success led to the fact that 'Tagesschau' moved into the program, actually uninterruptedly during my whole active time as a songwriter. It's a similar effect to my relative hit, You let yourself go." This was the title song of his second LP, in which Ekkes Frank accused the SPD of losing its contours, which - in view of the hopes placed in Willy Brandt - was a huge disappointment for him and others, as he said in an interview with the magazine 'Folk-Magazin' in 1981: "We thought at the time that this would be an opening for all the ailments that the parliamentary system had in our eyes at that time. And finally it was: Ostpolitik for example. But this picture soon cracked, and the SPD did its part."
www.ekkes.de
Extract fromVarious - songwriter in GermanyVol.2, For whom we sing (3-CD)
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