Sam Smith, Muse, and Mumford & Sons have at least one thing in common. They played at the tiny German music festival Haldern Pop before they were famous. Is Haldern a launchpad for stars?
Image: picture-allianc/empics/Y. Mok
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From Sam Smith to Muse, the German music festival that has a nose for talent
Sam Smith, Muse, and Mumford & Sons have at least one thing in common. They played at the tiny German music festival Haldern Pop before they were famous. Is Haldern a launchpad for stars?
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
Tocotronic - 1996
In the mid-1990s, four young men from Hamburg founded a band they named after the Japanese "Tricotronic" video game console. Every album after the 1999 "K.O.O.K" - their fifth - made it to the Top Ten of the German album charts. Three years earlier, the band gave Haldern Pop festival-goers a taste of their sound.
Image: Michael Petersohn
Muse -1999
Muse played in Haldern in 1999, at a time when the British band had just released its first and only mildly successful studio album, "Showbiz." Their international breakthrough came two years later with "Origin of Symmetry." Today, Muse ranks among the big names in the music industry. "Drones," the band's most recent studio album, was released in 2015.
Image: picture alliance/CITYPRESS 24
Sportfreunde Stiller - 1999
Sportfreunde Stiller also performed at Haldern Pop in 1999. A year later, the German indie rock band's first studio album hit the market, but it was their 2006 World Cup fan hymn "'54 '74 '90 2010" that really boosted the band's career. They've played in Haldern three times so far.
Image: Sportfreunde Stiller
Phoenix - 2001
When Phoenix played in Haldern in 2001, they had just released their first album "United." At the time, the four musicians from Versailles were still only known to insiders. Four years later, the French band rose to fame with "Alphabetical." That same year, the band also played at Rock am Ring, Germany's largest outdoor festival.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/F. Trueba
Starsailor - 2001
Starsailor won the hearts of the indie audience with melodious, melancholy songs at the start of the millennium. The British band played in Haldern shortly before launching its debut Album, "Love is here." A few years later, Starsailor was the opening act for U2 and the Rolling Stones, playing in decidedly larger arenas.
Image: picture alliance/Jazz Archiv/C. Fischer
Kate Nash - 2007
"Foundation" is the name of the catchy tune that made Kate Nash famous. The album "Made of Bricks" was released in 2007, and it quickly catapulted the London singer to the top of the British charts. The album won her gold in Germany in 2010. Nash played in Haldern twice, in 2007 and 2008.
Image: picture-allianc/dpa/A. Endermann
The National - 2008
Lead singer Matt Berninger's deep voice gives the US band's solemn songs a unique quality. The National's fifth Album, "High Violet," finally had the band on the way to fame in 2010. Their 2012 song "The Rains of Castamere" is on the soundtrack for the second season of the "Game of Thrones" fantasy TV series.
Image: picture alliance/dpa/J.-S. Goulao
Mumford & Sons - 2009
Marcus Mumford's band was so successful in Britain just a year after it formed that it was invited to play at the legendary Glastonbury Festival in 2008. Haldern Pop had the folk band on stage in 2009, just months before "Sigh No More" was released. A year later, the band returned to Haldern - this time, as one of the headliners.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
Sam Smith - 2014
The Haldern Pop organizers have a good sense of which newcomer band has the potential to make it big. Sometimes they book an artist on the brink of their breakthrough - when the festival rolls around, they're already big names. That's what happened in 2011 with James Blake and in 2014 with Sam Smith (pictured). Smith's debut album "In The Lonely Hour" was released that same year.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/S. Hoppe
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Haldern a serene little village on in Germany's Lower Rhine region, has about 5,000 inhabitants, a bakery, two supermarkets, a few pubs and a church. That's it.
But for many music fans from the US to Spain, Haldern is a household name. For the past 30 years, it's been home to Haldern Pop, a small but exclusive music festival.
It all started in 1981 when a group of altar boys organized a huge party because they felt their town was too quiet. The party on the premises of the town's Old Riding Arena was a big success.
Three years later, after forming a joint stock company, they launched Haldern Pop on June 23, 1984 - finally, with live music. Stefan Reichmann helped organize that first festival, and he's still the event's heart and soul today.
Savvy choices
Haldern Pop, it seems, is one of the last independent bastions in the commerce-driven music industry universe. The festival is enormously popular - the 2016 event was sold out last fall even before the line-up was announced. But year after year, no more than 7,000 tickets are available.
Haldern Pop doesn't survive on big name bands, but on the fact that quite a few bands that played here eventually made it big.
Muse rocked the stage in Haldern when they were still completely unknown. Sportfreunde Stiller and Mumford & Sons played to the town's green fields before moving to big arenas.
Obviously, not every band that plays Haldern Pop is destined for fame, and of course famous musicians perform there, too, as well as newcomers who've already made themselves a name, like Mando Diao, Franz Ferdinand and Travis. But Haldern Pop has come up with many a musical gem over the years. Click through the gallery above for some of the top names to come out of the festival.
