Reinhard Mey and his little liberties

Next to the stage of the Mercedes-Benz Arena, two fireflies dance happily and excitedly through the air. They move up the steps to the stage until they stop at the top. Now a silhouette separates from the fireflies. Foreboding applause erupts as the silhouette moves towards the center of the stage in the semidarkness. A picturesquely illuminated acoustic guitar is waiting there in a stand. The fireflies are flashlights that stagehand Reinhard Mey used to show the way to his concert.

As soon as Reinhard Mey has reached the guitar, he spreads his arms and smiles, as if to apologize for the fact that the corona pandemic had just postponed his performance by a year. The applause gets even louder. In the meantime, he puts the instrument on his shoulders and, in front of a black curtain as the stage background, as in a school auditorium, begins with the title track of his first album, which was released in 1967: "I wanted to sing like Orpheus".

He does without fellow musicians. And not one of the oversized video screens that has long been customary at events of this size stands to the left or right of the stage. There aren't any crowds of dancers jumping and dancing around him, let alone showing off a few dance steps himself. After all, it can't be said with the best will in the world that the singer, wearing a dark shirt with jeans, dressed up too much. In fact, in 2022 he will appear as if he were not in a huge multifunctional hall, but still at the folk festival on the meadow near Waldeck Castle in the Hunsrück, where his career got its first boost almost 60 years ago.

Then as now, he relies on nothing but a guitar and his voice to get people listening. With bass tones from the three deep strings, he indicates the harmonies, which he plays around with sparkling tones on the three high strings. As he sings, Reinhard Mey realizes that, unlike the mythical poet-singer Orpheus, he cannot “make rocks weep”. Instead, he admits his "mediocrity," but has "won you over" for it. This can be taken as an encouraging finding: A lack of genius does not have to be an obstacle to writing a lot of hits, including a number of songs that people still quote like proverbs to this day.

After the last note of his confession, Reinhard Mey raises his striking hand. He forms a claw with his fingers for a moment. He is reminiscent of a magician who holds his hands wide-eyed and with a tense facial expression, as if he could move objects without having to touch them. Meanwhile he has visibly plucked tones. He now releases them with relaxed gestures from his hand so that they float freely through the audience rows in the aftertaste.

On it he presents a series of songs from his latest album "Das Haus an der Ampel". “Gerd and Frank”, for example, is about two people who meet and have a good life together until Frank finds a message from the doctor in the mailbox. Gerd tries to cheer him up, but all their joint plans between the Way of St. James and the cruise can no longer be implemented. There is just enough time for Frank to travel to Zurich without a return ticket and end his life there of his own accord. But "Gerd and Frank" is by no means a plea for euthanasia. Rather, with the song, Reinhard Mey delivers another deeply touching story of how normal life strikes in a normal way.

“I love to be among people” in turn is based on a cheerful agreement. The singer shares how he is saved by football fans before he can be beaten up by a Nazi. This is how he finds his newest sporting love: "FC St. Pauli, my club from now on." With pieces like this, the experienced songwriter shows how few thematic boundaries he has to set himself. Even his sofa, his "old friend", the wine and all the rooms on the way, "from the flophouse to the five-star hotel", which took him "through the night" on tours after the concerts, have him to rhyme and melodies stimulated.

For him, life everywhere shows a magic that is always worth capturing in music. "I've been doing this here," says Reinhard Mey, "for 60 years. As far as I'm concerned, I'd be happy to continue doing this for another 60 years.” And preferably with the people who have always been important to him. For example, it was always easy for him, he continues, to remain faithful. This is also due to the small freedoms that his wife allows him. When the audience almost thinks that Reinhard Mey might be in favor of a more open marriage here and there, he clarifies it in a friendly way: Visits to Obi, where men are explained about products while the wives park outside. The audience sighs and yells, they know what's coming next: "Men in the hardware store".

The pop singer Andrea Berg proved again recently that his songs also unfold their amazing effect in front of a large audience when they are interpreted by others, when she had to sit down on her own stage to hear “Über den Wolken” being performed. Reinhard Mey himself plays his most famous song as the first encore.

Before and after him, others thought about the freedom sung about in the refrain. Ritchie Havens, for example, who saw a connection between a motherless child and freedom when he appeared in Woodstock. Kris Kristofferson resignedly described freedom as a situation in which one had nothing to lose, and Marius Müller-Westernhagen found that an undefined freedom was lacking. However, Havens, Kristofferson and Westernhagen now sound as if they were talking about luxury problems back then.

Reinhard Mey understands freedom more pragmatically, as an opportunity to take a different perspective and thus get a clear view. For example, when certain problems above the clouds that seem big on earth suddenly turn out to be trivial and small and therefore solvable.

As a dramaturgically highly effective indication that the end of the concert is near, he plays "Gute Nacht,Freunde" at the end. Many click their tongues. Couples sway gently to the beat. Others swing their mobile phones back and forth like a candle in their raised hands. They sing along, animated, but not too loud so as not to disturb the intensity of the parting moment. Reinhard Mey recognizes the perfect timing for the end of the concert and says: "Now I'll quote Pippi Longstocking: 'You should really go now. Because if you don't go home, you can't come back. And that would be a shame'.”