Einführung in deutsche Musik [Introduction into German Music]

German Music

„Ohne Musik wäre das Leben ein Irrtum“. (Friedrich Nietzsche 1844-1900) (Without music, life would be a mistake.)

Article by Zac Sullivan
Follow on Twitter @XakSullivan
Zac Sullivan posts include German Viral Video & Music Makes You Smarter

Liebe Leser (Dear Readers),

When Nietzsche said, without music, life would be a mistake, perhaps he was being hyperbolic, or maybe music and music lessons just make life that much better. In the same way, using German music to help you learn German should help you make fewer mistakes (when you memorize German phrases from songs), and improve your overall German-learning experience.

Listening to German music regularly when learning the language is arguably one of the best things you can do to aid your learning the language. I would go so far as to recommend falling asleep listening to German music on your iPod. While there is a select variety of subliminal German-learning products, I have not personally opted to use these, though if you have, please let me know whether you feel they helped, etc. I did not opt to use these, firstly [erstens] because when I was learning German I didn’t even know they existed, and secondly [zweitens], I did not think about it. But now, it’s just hard for me to imagine that they would be more interesting to me than getting a feel for German culture through the messages that people try to convey in their lyrics. I spent a lot of time listening to whatever German music I could find and I liked fairly well. Though I didn’t completely understand a lot of the lyrics from bands like Die Ärzte, I must admit I learned a lot of new vocabulary through their song texts.

Note: It’s not enough to simply listen when you are a beginner. Go to Google and type in the title of the German song, followed by “Songtext”, and chances are great you’ll get the lyrics to the song you want. Simply searching with the English word “lyrics” may yield unfavorable results on the other hand. You’ll want to use the online German Dictionary to do a bit a self-translating on the songs you like and want to understand.

Modern Listening Suggestions for Learning German

1) Die Wise Guys, known for such classics-to-be as ,,Du bist dran mit Spülen” (It’s your turn to do the dishes) are based out of Köln (English name of city: Cologne), and ja, that is whence the product cologne originated [in German, cologne is ,,kölnisches Wasser"]. Cologne is also famed for its wondrous cathedral [der Kölner Dom], which is not here, but it is there (so I can’t say it’s neither here, nor there). At any rate, this is a tangent, but the cathedral is really great to see and the most noted landmark of the city. The Wise Guys sing in both English and German and are almost entirely a capella. Sometimes they even sing in Denglisch (Deutsch + Englisch), and even have a song about that phenomenon itself. That’s so meta.

Many of their songs are test-driveable at YouTube and often with the German lyrics already visible in the videos. They often serve as supplemental German teaching tools for their somewhat straightforward, clearly audible lyrics. The production on the records tends to be slick as for Die Prinzen, and since The Wise Guys sing a cappella, you can make out the words easier, as they are not overpowered by the music. I love to listen to their German language version of Britney Spears’ “Hit Me Baby One More Time” – “Schlag mich Baby noch einmal“.

Their bestselling and most liked album is most likely Wo der Pfeffer wächst (Where the Pepper Grows, i.e. someplace far away from Germany, as in the song they are wishing someone to go far away from them). The album may be ridiculously expensive as an import CD, though you might be able to get one used on the cheap, or you can buy the mp3 version for about $9.

2) Die Ärzte (The Doctors) are a unique sort of punkish pop-rock band, fused with with a ska-like penchant for playing on the offbeat which culminated into an eventual spin-off band called Farin Urlaub, a pun of “Fahr in Urlaub,” (meaning to go on vacation), though it could also be an English pun meaning “far in vacation,” and linked by the band member Jan Vetter, who is the lead singer in both bands. Popularity-wise, Die Ärzte are the German Beatles, though their music is not so similar to Beatles music as it is to, oh, for example, The Smiths?

There is really too much to say about Die Ärzte to write here, so suffice it to say that they have been enormously popular in Germany, and continue to be popular with mit der Jugend (with the youth) today. Classic songs such as “Männer sind Schweine” and “Schlaflied” remain staples of the college level American German learner. The Doctors, if you will, have a fantastically large œvre (body of work).

3) Die Prinzen (The Princes) – for years both enjoyed and disparaged by German learners – are very poppy and kind of like German Backstreet Boys. Songs you should know by the Prinzen von Pop include: “Millionär,” “Deutschland,” and “Küssen verboten,” among others. But if you like their (somewhat less serious) music, why not get some of their songs to keep around the house?

Here is a wide variety of other German music sample links I have collected for your entertainment. Please enjoy and let me know what you think!

What German music do you like / dislike and why? Please post below.