Frank Schöbel once sang at the opening of the World Cup. His hits are still heard in the East. A conversation about unwanted status symbols and why meeting Stasi boss Erich Mielke reminds him of a Loriot sketch.
From
Thomas Oechsner and Steffen Uhlmann
Frank Schöbel, the undisputed hit giant in East Germany during the GDR era, doesn’t look 80, you have to give him that. But he is. The pop singer and composer comes to the SZ office in Berlin in jeans and a leather jacket – he later says he still has around 20 others hanging at home. A tick, just like the doctor’s bag he’s carrying today. He has been touring with a model like this for 60 years. Actually, Schöbel didn’t want to talk at all, he says he’s had to be annoyed too often by malicious reports in the press in the West. Now he’s talking.