Dozens of music bands will perform at the Corso Leopold in Schwabing this weekend. Without a doubt, the Pullach band “Agratt” has the most stage experience. The singer is the master stage technician in the Pullach community center, the lighting master plucks the guitar, the sound engineer is responsible for the booming bass and the band is completed by a building yard worker and the daughter of a local councillor. It goes without saying that Mayor Susanna Millennium is keeping her fingers crossed for the band’s performance, as she is the employer of three. When the band sings “You are the flower from the community building” by Wolfgang Ambros in the Schwabing night sky on Saturday, they are not meant.
They will bring soft rock to the MuThaRy stage on Leopoldstraße, at Ohmstraße, which will be theirs for one hour from 10 p.m. Elvis Presley, Spider Murphy, STS, Peter Cornelius are among others on their list. “We see ourselves as a company band,” says bassist Michael Burger, the sound engineer who, as a teenager, stood on the stage of the Munich Congress Hall singing classical music until his voice broke and he is now the only one who, like him, is not given a microphone says with a smile.
“Agratt” already has 60 songs in its repertoire, which is quite astonishing for a band that hasn’t had much opportunity to practice since it was founded in October 2020 and an appearance at an open-air event in July 2021 on the Pullach lawn swimming pool did not come out. Because – agratt – shortly afterwards the corona virus silenced all live bands.
Corona has so far prevented events with an audience
“Agratt” is a Bavarian synonym for “of all things”. The fact that the musicians gave themselves this name is due to an accumulation of coincidences that led to the formation of the band, as band leader Sigi Reiner (vocals, cajon) reports. He actually only wanted to play a little music with a friend, the building yard worker Thomas Schwarze (guitar, vocals) on the stage of the community center, reports the stage technician, when the sound engineer Burger (bass, keyboard, Jew’s harp, just no vocals) and came back shortly afterwards with the bass guitar. In the next moment, the new lighting master Arthur Zacharias came “agratt” into the hall. Yes, he plays the guitar, he replied, and that was the hard core of the band, Reiner remembers.
Finally, there was Nadja Ptacek, the youngest daughter of SPD local councilor Holger Ptacek. The music student jumped in at short notice for a drummer who was involved in a motorcycle accident and has been a member of the band ever since, at the age of 14, mind you, which is why she has to bring a declaration of consent from her parents to her performance. But they are in the audience. The girl is an all-rounder, plays the piano, drums, keyboard, clarinet, saxophone and sings in a choir.
Of course, everyone is nervous before their first big performance on Saturday, says Michael Burger, who has been working as a stage technician on the stages of Corso Leopold for ten years, including this weekend. “If I don’t get nervous anymore, then I’ll stop immediately,” he says. Lots of things can go wrong. For example, he once stood in front of a five-meter-wide stage that should have fit into a three-meter-wide tent. But the fact that their music is well received by people was evident at the first public appearance at the open-air event in the outdoor pool. They were then approached by visitors who would have liked to book them for a performance. “Agratt then came Corona,” reports Burger.
The weather service predicts gusty winds and rain for this Saturday. But maybe the Pullach band is lucky that agratt closes the floodgates during their performance Petrus.