When the hill in the Paul-Diehl-Park becomes a grandstand on Thursday evening and gradually fills up with visitors, the first barrel is tapped and the opening band sends their sound from the open-air stage at the foot of the hill into the summer evening, then it’s finally over culture festival in Gräfelfing again. The last one took place four years ago, twice it had to be canceled due to the pandemic. Visitors are now allowed to visit Bavaria’s oldest open-air festival without restrictions – and there are sometimes up to 30,000. On Thursday, July 28, at 6 p.m. is the tapping, until Sunday, July 31, there is music of all genres on four stages. In an interview with the SZ, Simon Zilker, new chairman of the Graefelfing Culture Festival Association, explains what is new and what the organization team is up to in the last few days of preparation.
SZ: Mr. Zilker, how does it feel to be rebuilding a festival city in the park after four years?
Simon Zilker: The anticipation is huge – that applies to all around 100 helpers. The festival takes place every two years, everything was already organized for 2020, so we decided early on not to organize it after all. We couldn’t imagine holding a cultural festival under Covid restrictions. 2021 didn’t look any better either, so we didn’t even start planning. Now we can finally do a festival again without restrictions.
Simon Zilker, 22, is the new chairman of the Graefelfing Culture Festival association.
(Photo: private)
A lot has happened behind the scenes over the years. At the age of 22 you are the new chairman of the Kulturfestival Gräfelfing association. What does this mean for the festival?
The entire board has experienced a rejuvenation – the old board worked towards this in a targeted manner. I replaced the long-time chairman Peter Klostermeier, his departure was planned. On average, we are 30 years old on the board, but there are still a few long-standing board members. The rejuvenation will also show up a bit in the program. This year, for the first time, we have a DJ tent where, among other things, techno, house and hip-hop will be played. That hasn’t existed before, and it’s intended to attract a young audience in particular. On Friday, for example, “The Sad Gardener” from Vienna will perform techno-trance trash. Otherwise, the culture festival remains what it is: a music festival with well-known international bands and promising young musicians of all music genres.
What are the highlights in the program?
Phew, that’s really hard to single out, we have bands from ten countries on the program and they’re all so good! We are proud, for example, that Santa Salut from Spain is with us with Hip-Hop españiol (July 31st). Or the band Direct from the Netherlands (July 31) whose single “Soldier On” became the anthem for heroic nurses and hospital workers during the Corona crisis. They were number one in the Dutch airplay charts for ten weeks. Some also come to us more often, for example Pho Queue (29th of July). They were there in 2018 and made a great sound, but because of the insane heat, the hill, our visitors’ gallery, was almost empty. You have to have heard them. And then Xavier Polycarpe is back with Pop Francaise, who literally shook the tent in 2018, now he’s coming with another band.
The festival isn’t just about music, it’s also about meeting old acquaintances, spending a family day on the premises, eating and drinking. What is the supporting program?
The youth center organizes a children’s program and the Wiener Prater-Kasperl performs several times. As always, on Sunday at 11.30 a.m. there will be a morning pint with music and of course plenty to eat, from Thai to vegetarian – the meat-free booth is new – and drinks from wine and beer to cocktails. Incidentally, we will keep the prices largely stable despite inflation – the beer costs five euros like in 2018. We urgently need to sell it. Admission is free, but of course the bands receive fees and our infrastructure also costs a lot, which we achieve through the sale of food and drinks. On top of that, we receive a grant of 15,000 euros from the municipality, a grant from the federal government’s Corona fund and luckily our sponsors from the unusual 2020 festival are all there again.
What worries you now, a few days before the start?
We just hope that the weather will play along and that some of our helpers will not be canceled due to Corona. We need all hands. We’ve only been meeting outdoors for weeks now and taking care. And then we are excited about the rush of visitors. Recently it has been shown that people tend to starve after such events due to the long break in the pandemic. We definitely ordered more glasses than usual.