It’s pretty shaky up there. When Klaus Leutgeb jerks on the man-high roller box, it jerks. But looks outstanding. finds the photographer. Leutgeb wears a gray checked suit, horn-rimmed glasses and a rockabilly parting. “Great, great, great,” the photographer cheered him on. click click click. The scenery is also impressive: the almost completely assembled concert stage on the open-air site of the Munich-Riem Exhibition Centre. “A monster,” says the man on the box. He put them up here: “We let the dragon out of the cage.”
The cattle has 150 meters. Is three times as wide as the current working platform of the giant tomaniacs Rammstein. This “multifunctional marvel” remains open at the top, the sky opens up and plays with 5000 headlights and light strips in a Bavarian diamond shape. Leutgeb has “something against proscenium stages”, so there is no roof. If it rains, the musicians take shelter under a second level, which they can reach and play on in dry weather by stairs or elevator. This bridge alone is 50 meters wide, as is the stadium stage Rolling Stones. It already feels like standing under the Benediktenwand when setting up in Riem. The man up there remembers that he is “actually afraid of heights” and would rather get off the box.
One of a kind: Klaus Leutgeb from Graz is planning the biggest concerts of the year in Germany, but has also made many opponents.
(Photo: Robert Haas)
Which is a bit surprising because Leutgeb is Austrian. He did ski openings in Schladming, for example, which are mass parties with concerts. But something as gigantic as in Munich is new for the 52-year-old, the “biggest challenge” of his life, the worst and at the same time the most beautiful. He wants: “To do things that others don’t do.” Now the idea grew in him to organize a concert with Andreas Gabalier in Munich, and of all things at an Andreas Gabalier concert in Munich. So he grabs a ready-made dirndl and lederhosen magnet that others have made big. But Leutgeb thought even bigger, “more unique”, of a “people’s rock’n’roller fan festival” with a fairground for the pop preacher on the mountain, not with 70,000 visitors, but with 150,000 visitors where there was already a pope had blessed.
Dirndl and lederhosen magnet: the Austrian alpine rocker Andreas Gabalier returns with the album “A New Beginning”.
(Photo: Alex Halada/AFP)
Leutgeb is standing in the middle of an arena construction site with ten grandstand blocks, the diamond shape and dimensions of which are reminiscent of an American baseball stadium. Where batsman and pitcher are the focus there, all eyes will be on Andreas Gabalier, Helene Fischer and Robbie Williams here in August. Because when the organizer had to postpone the mass spectacle with Gabalier twice because of Corona, he added two other entertainment leaders to make the huge effort worthwhile. Whereby, the return on investment is very, very tight, although about 130,000 tickets have already been sold at Gabalier and Fischer, and at least 90,000 at Williams (from 70 to 600 euros). A total of 5,000 employees are working on the project, and the equipment is brought in in 500 articulated lorries. But due to the pandemic, the war in Ukraine and the energy crisis, costs have exploded, which has “given him many sleepless nights”.
Robbie Williams is back. The British singer released an orchestral album this year with his hits and the new song “Lost”.
(Photo: Georg Wendt/dpa)
The sympathy of the local organizers for the new competitor is limited. From the first rumours, they formed a front against the former Sturm Graz Vice, bathing lake and nightclub operator. Above all, they were very surprised at how easily the city put this area reserved for parking lots and flea markets, for which they had applied for ages, at the feet of a foreigner. The word “mousselling” was often used. Of course, Leutgeb complained about “envy, resentment and ego” and that those who had no ideas attacked him, the “visionary”, and ultimately harmed Munich as a cultural location. He wanted to establish the city “as one of the most important locations for the international music scene, comparable to the open-air series in London’s Hyde Park”. “The pictures will go around the world,” says Leutgeb. He convinced Clemens Baumgärtner, head of economics and tourism, to support him in the town hall and at the trade fair. Recently, the competition suspected that Leutgeb had made it much easier with the permits than they did themselves. Of course, the Grazer doesn’t want to leave it like that. There is “in no way any relief”, one hundred officials are sitting in the congress center and would “check everything for points and commas”. He turns that into a hymn of praise for the “incredibly professionally developed authority structure in Munich” and for the representatives of the police, KVR, fire protection and trade fair: “I’m incredibly happy to be here, at the end of the day you need someone who critically questioned.” The lightning protection system alone cost 500,000 euros, and nothing is more important to him than the safety of visitors.
She was “so ready” after the baby break, said Helene Fischer behind the stage of the TV show “The Big Hit Comeback”. The singer from Ammersee also related this to her only live concert in 2022 in Munich: “It will be gigantic.”
(Photo: Jan Woitas/dpa)
Leutgeb doesn’t want to be the bogeyman. He is active in children’s cancer aid and in “Licht ins Dunkel” and is brother-in-law of DJ Ötzi (known to be a good-hearted one), he drops. He can pull you away. So did Gabalier, Fischer and Williams, whom he personally called and wrapped around his finger. Objections from the opponents, since a thick check book would have been enough to quickly buy “three galas”, scratch on Leutgeb’s honor as organizer. He, who “had to walk a lot in life”, is finally where he always wanted to be with his dream of being creative. “These will be unique shows like there have never been before.” And not on the Fischer Tour 2023 either. The hit queen has been rehearsing new dances and never-before-seen acrobatic stunts with her team for three weeks just for this show.
Eight kilometers of LED strips are to set lighting accents on the stage (here a plan for Robbie Williams).
(Photo: Florian Wieder/Wiederdesign Munich / LA)
For him, Fischer, Gabalier and Williams are the best live artists in the world who “form a unit with the audience”. Only because of that, and because of the stage, which has been tailored to everyone’s needs, could it work out in such a huge way. He was “grateful” for the criticism from Olympiapark boss Marion Schöne that every guest would only see a little person on stage. He then optimized it: As in the Olympic Stadium, nobody was further than 168 meters from the stage, he bought 2000 square meters of LED screens and distributed 18 loudspeaker towers around the area, not to be louder, but to offer everyone the same sound quality – “I copied that from the Bregenz Festival”. the stage was designed by his buddy Flo Wieder, a Munich native who works in LA for TV shows from ESC to the “MTV Awards” and “American Idol”; the lighting designer, Roland Greil, also from Munich, recently let Rammstein go up in flames; the London company Wonder Works is otherwise planning for the Olympic Games. He only wants the best for his best. It can make you dizzy. Leutgeb scrambles back down onto asphalt from the heights. When it comes to the future of the trade fair, he doesn’t squint at new peaks: the situation is too uncertain right now, he says, and he doesn’t have anything major in the pipeline for the time being.
Andreas Gabalier, Sat., Aug. 6, Helene Fischer, Sat., Aug. 20, Robbie Williams, Sat., Aug. 27, Messe Riem