Marco Demel saves his two-day Bob Dylan Festival and moves from Kranichstein to the Darmstadt pedagogue
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Bob Dylan will be eighty on May 24th – this is also celebrated extensively in Darmstadt.
(Archive photo: dpa)
DARMSTADT – Even the restart after the first opportunities to open up requires flexibility in planning from the cultural sector. Marco Demel, Darmstadt radio presenter and Bob Dylan specialist, had to completely reschedule his festival for the musician’s 80th birthday – although the current regulations would have even allowed the originally planned open-air event in the Kranichstein hunting lodge.
But after an inspection last week, there was no approval from the city, reports Demel. In addition, corrections to the program were necessary; the Austrian author Stefan Kutzenberger canceled the trip to Germany because he should have expected a quarantine on his return. And with Wolfgang Seeliger, Demel came to the conclusion that a performance on stage with a small cast of six to seven singers is currently not justifiable due to the risk of infection.
Nevertheless Demel managed to save his “Darmstadt Dylan Days”. He has relocated the entire program with a sizeable cast to the Theater im Pädagog (TiP) and can therefore only offer the audience the live stream. But because TiP boss Klaus Lavies is currently putting the garden in front of his theater back into operation, there should still be a festival atmosphere: book and CD tables and an environment that invites the artists and guests to exchange ideas.
There are three program blocks. They will be opened on Saturday, May 22nd, at 5 p.m. by Thomas Quartier: The Belgian Benedictine monk and Dylan enthusiast will bring his spiritual, master-inspired songs to Darmstadt. Then Georg Stein from the Heidelberg publishing house Palmyra tells about various Dylan books and the “Temples in Flames” tour from 1987, before Steve Baker from Schneverdingen makes music in the heath.
For Sunday, May 23rd, Demel promises the “who’s who of the German Dylan scene”. “Dylan’s Dream” from Northern Hesse and Manfred Maurenbrecher from Berlin will be offering their versions of Dylan songs from 4 pm, from 7 pm it will be Winfried Klima and Jadwiga Frej’s turn, and violinist Scarlet Rivera and author Louie Kemp will be switched on via zoom.
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