On March 13, 1934, the Comedian Harmonists for the last time in Munich, a little later what is still the most famous vocal ensemble was banned. The insane reason: Three of the six members were Jews. On March 13, 2003, five young singers and a pianist took to the stage in the auditorium of Munich’s Ludwig-Maximilians-University to sing the big hits of the time. The pianist and founding member Jan Golch recalls that it was “more of a teenage ensemble” back then: students, people doing community service, beginning singing students.
But after almost 900 people wanted to hear the first concert, they just kept going. Since then they are nostalphonic also performed in Japan, Egypt and Russia, cut a fine figure at Maxim’s in Paris and on a luxury cruise around South America.
The black tailcoat with a white bow tie is still as obligatory today as “My little green cactus” or “In the bar at the crocodile”. But just as the Comedian Harmonists adapted hits and operetta melodies for their cast, Jan Golch has also expanded the repertoire with his arrangements over the years, “always along the 1930s”https://www.sueddeutsche.de/muenchen/.”Wir found our style, which is a bit loose,” he says. So the Nostalphoniker always include conferences, underlining the songs with gestural and dance elements.
Launching pad for great solo careers
That a vocal ensemble has existed for more than twenty years is a rarity, if only because of the complex coordination of dates. In addition to Golch, two of the founding members are still there today, others have had great careers as soloists: Tareq Nazmi, for example, who is now touring the world as a bass, or the baritone Ludwig Mittelhammer, today a member of the Gärtnerplatztheater ensemble.
“The Nostalphoniker contributed to the fact that they went down this path in the first place,” Golch is convinced. It was easy to find new blood, especially from the Munich Music Academy. Over the years, entire stage shows have been created in collaboration with the directors Dominik Wilgenbus and Georg Blüml. The boys swapped their tuxedos for bathing suits, of course in proper style from the 1930s. If only because they “like to sing the more slippery things”, as Golch says.
The nostalphonists proved that they can also be more serious with their touching homage “Die Comedian Harmonists sang…”, in which they included contemporary documents about the involuntary stage farewells of the great role models. In 2016 they performed their last tour, including on March 13 of that year at the Jewish Center in Munich under the patronage of Charlotte Knobloch and Franz Herzog von Bayern.
Knobloch will also speak next Saturday when the Nostalphoniker celebrate their 20th anniversary in the Künstlerhaus, as “Munich’s former youngest vocal ensemble”, as Golch puts it with the irony typical of the ensemble. Although they also want to tell some of the anecdotes that come together when six men in tails are on the road for twenty years.
20 years nostaphonic! – The anniversary concert, Sat., March 18, 7.30 p.m., Künstlerhaus am Lenbachplatz, (sold out)