Dear media partners, dear colleagues,
Tonight, Reeperbahn Festival 2018 was opened at Schmidts Tivoli. During the opening event, whose emphasis was on this year's partner country France with speeches by the Plenipotentiary of the Federal Republic of Germany for cultural affairs within the Treaty on Franco-German cooperation, Dr. Peter Tschentscher, and the Ambassador of France to the Federal Republic of Germany, Anne-Marie Descôtes, the jury and the eight participating bands and artists of ANCHOR Reeperbahn Festival International Music Award were also presented before the live performance by the British soul collective Jungle showed what the focus of the next four days will be: music!
Frehn Hawel 

Hamburg, 19 September 2018
The speeches at the opening, hosted by Ray Cokes in his usual humorous way, made clear how perfectly this year's partner country France fits into the 13th Reeperbahn Festival. In their joint welcome speech, Reeperbahn Festival Managing Director Alexander Schulz and Marc Thonon (CEO Le Bureau Export) stressed the immense significance of the German market for the diversified music landscape of France apart from its geographic neighbourhood and historical connection.
In his speech, Dr. Peter Tschentscher emphasised the economic power of the music industry as well as the importance of creating viable future models for sustainable livelihoods of artists. In this context, Reeperbahn Festival is the ideal place for all these aspects to coincide.
In a fervent appeal against increasing extremist ideas all over Europe, the Ambassador of France to the Federal Republic of Germany, Anne-Marie Descôtes, stressed the vital role of music for overcoming cultural differences. Dr. Andreas Görgen (Director-General for Culture and Communication, Federal Foreign Office) placed Reeperbahn Festival on par with the Berlinale and the Frankfurt Book Fair, which, as lighthouse events in their corresponding genres, are also well suited to represent cultural industry from Germany abroad. Görgen referred to the numerous Reeperbahn Festival activities in the course of the Deutschlandjahr USA which will begin in October 2018 in Los Angeles with concerts, networking events as well as the exhibition of Klaus Voormann to be continued in 2019 with further international Reeperbahn Festival performances.  

After the ANCHOR Jury president Tony Visconti had invited this year's ANCHOR Jury, consisting of Linda Perry, Skye Edwards, Cassandra Steen and Jason Bentley, onto the stage, the eight nominated bands and artists of this year's competition were presented. The brilliant live performance of the British soul collective Jungle finished the opening to send the visitors into four days and nights filled with music.  

The Wunderkinder programme on Wednesday evening was a fine kick-off into the Reeperbahn Festival 2018, with ten hand-picked German artists being presented to international music business representatives, continuing the success story of the Reeperbahn Festival music export programme in its sixth year. Here you will find all participating Wunderkinder. 

On Tuesday evening, the Reeperbahn Festival 2018 film and arts programme already started with "Here To Be Heard – The Story of The Slits" at the Abaton cinema and the vernissage of Klaus Voormann's exhibition "It Started In Hamburg".  We are looking forward to three further days of musical surprises in St. Pauli!  

Suprise guest: Philipp Poisel on 20 September, 11:00 pm at Uebel & Gefährlich!
Ten years after his first Reeperbahn Festival performance, Philipp Poisel is returning with his band! Even if the German songwriter has been filling large halls, close contact to his fans has always been important to him in his career – this makes his performance at Reeperbahn Festival 2018 the ideal start of his club tour!

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The Reeperbahn Festival is organised by Reeperbahn Festival GbR
and Inferno Events GmbH & Co. KG.
Neuer Pferdemarkt 1, 20359 Hamburg
www.reeperbahnfestival.com

PhG Reeperbahn Festival GbR: Inferno Events GmbH & Co. KG und Karsten Jahnke Konzertdirektion GmbH;
Gf: Alexander Schulz / U-I-Nr.: DE247756458

PhG Inferno Events GmbH & Co. KG: Inferno Events Verwaltungs GmbH;
Gf: Alexander Schulz, Detlef Schwarte / U-I-Nr.: DE 210469759

Photo: Leila Ivarsson