Biography:

Hans Scheibner (August 27, 1936 in Hamburg ,  May 23, 2022  ) was a German satirist , songwriter and cabaret artist . ^[3]

After graduating from high school in 1953, Hans Scheibner trained as a publishing clerk at the Hamburger Fremdenblatt . After completing his apprenticeship, he first worked as an editor at this newspaper, then from 1959 as a commercial correspondent in a paint factory. As early as 1954, while he was a trainee, he joined the theater team at Markus Scholz’s theater 53 , where he and Uwe Friedrichsen played a well-received “Wolfgang Borchert evening”, at which Ida honor was also a guest. He also co-wrote his first comedy , Die Laufmaschen, with Markus Scholz .

In 1968 he appeared for the first time with satirical-lyrical texts and poems, which he called Lästerlyrik in reference to the blasphemous songs by the songwriter Fritz Graßhoff , who was a friend of his. With these works, he became increasingly well-known in the Hamburg cabaret and pub scene and wrote a number of songs for Meyers Dampfkapelle . Together with this band he belonged to the then flourishing Hamburg scene around the music bar Onkel Pö . In 1972 his first volume of blasphemous poetry, Mr. ES, was published , for which Werner Finck wrote an enthusiastic recommendation. 1973 was followed by When the Nightingale Strikes , 1974mockery as a greeting .

In 1974, Scheibner wrote the lyrics to the successful song “Hamburg ’75” for Gottfried & Lonzo – two other protagonists of the pensioners’ band – in which the two, as future residents of a retirement home, look back wistfully on their heyday. Scheibner was also successful with his song “I like to stand on the assembly line”, which he brought out with Meyers Dampfkapelle . As an advertising copywriter, he also came up with the well-known energy advertising slogan “I am two oil tanks”. The German lyrics to the song Schmidtchen Schleicher , with which Nico Haak landed a Top 10 hit in Germany in 1976, were also penned by Scheibner . In 1977 Scheibner put together the collection of satirical everyday storiesIn the valley where the treadmills stand before, as well as another volume of blasphemous poetry, mockery is omnipotent .

From 1975 he performed with the Dutch pianist and composer Berry Sarluis. His LP “Heiliger Marx” caused a great stir, with which he mocked the prophets of the socialist workers’ and farmers’ state, including “Hannes Wacker, the singer with the workers’ songs”, completely contrary to the West German mainstream. He lost the sympathy and recognition of the left scene and thus the cabaret prize. With over a hundred satirical songs and chansons (LPs on phonogram, polydor, RCA), he is one of the best-known German singer-songwriters. But even in this scene he lost a lot of sympathy, among other things, with his satirical article in the mirror about German-speaking singer-songwriters “Das wiegt nur ein Vogelschiß”. ^[4] [5]

In 1977 Scheibner’s LP Achterndiek was released with the title song of the same name, an anti-nuclear song based on the Grimm fairy tale Vom Fischer und his Frau , which also criticizes environmental pollution as a whole. The LP followed in 1979. It doesn’t matter, nobody notices! whose satirical title song of the same name became his most popular song, also because Scheibner repeatedly expanded it over the years with new stanzas dealing with current events.

In the 1980s, Scheibner became known nationwide with the satirical television program … scheibnsweise on NDR television , but it also increasingly attracted the attention of those who felt offended by his satires. To a large extent, environmental issues were also addressed, such as the Wadden Sea National Park , car emissions in Hamburg and Greenpeace (in the song David Grünfried ).

On November 1, 1985, a scandal broke out when Scheibner sang on the NDR talk show celebrating the 30th anniversary of the Bundeswehr in a modification of the Tucholsky quote: The women (of today) cannot be saved themselves. They still send their sons to war and share beds with murderers! His show … was canceled and the Hamburger Abendblatt parted ways with him as a columnist.

Scheibner subsequently toured Germany as a cabaret artist and became a columnist for the Hamburger Morgenpost newspaper . In 1991, when the excitement about the “soldiers are murderer quote” had subsided, Scheibner was able to appear on the NDR regional program before the NDR talk show with his five-minute satirical contribution Fünf vor Talk . After six years of a daily column, a total of 2000, for the Hamburger Morgenpost , difficulties arose again here – because of a satire about the conspicuous sympathy of Hamburg police officers for the neo-Nazi scene. Scheibner refused to exchange the text; and he was fired. The publishing manager at that time was Gerd Schulte-Hillen .

1986 appeared as a dtv paperback Der Santa Claus in distress , which reached the 27th edition in 2012. It already included the first story, titled Who Takes Grandma . This is also the name of the Christmas program with songs, sketches and scenes, which brought Scheibner a great stage success. From 1992 he brought (usually with his wife Petra-Verena Milchert and his daughter Raffaela) who takes grandma? at all well-known cabarets and on theater stages from Kiel to Stuttgart. Under the title Who takes grandma? and where to go with grandma? Two bestsellers (Ellert & Richter and Ullstein) and four audio books were published by Hörbuch Verlag Hamburg.

In 1992 and 1993 he presented a total of 25 satirical references to the daily topics on ARD . Here, too, a scandal erupted. It was about abortion paragraph 218 . The Saxon interior minister at the time demanded the resignation of NDR director Jobst Plog and a lifetime ban on television for Scheibner. In 1996 and 1998 he again produced the show … apparently for NDR television. From 2001 to 2006, Scheibner again enjoyed great public success. The NDR broadcast the political satire Walther and Willy a total of 266 times in its early evening program DAS. Scheibner discussed current political and social events with his dog. In 2004, the Miko Edition published an illustrated book: They’re spinning, these people . The show was canceled in April 2006 for unknown reasons despite high ratings.

In 2005, many of his old blasphemous poems were published under the title I’ll never grow up, never! re-released on dtv . Since 2007, Scheibner has been writing a weekly column for all newspapers of the shz (Schleswig-Holstein newspaper publisher) with great success. Scheibner wrote and performed four new cabaret programs, two solo plays: 2006 The Golfer (Altonaer Theater and Switzerland), 2008 “Herzklopfen” (Kiel: Theater Die Komödianten) directed by 18-year-old Julie Maillot . In 2009 he played his two-person comedy Die Versöhnung together with Hannelore Dröge until 2011 at the Altonaer Theater and on tour. Directed by Axel Schneider.

In 2010, Hans Scheibner received the Biermann-Ratjen Medal ^[6] awarded by the Hamburg Senate.

In 2012, under the impression of the banking scandals and the financial crisis, he wrote the satirical comedy Die Geiselnahme , which premiered on June 30, 2013 in the Hamburger Kammerspiele. Directed by Hanns Christian Müller, Alexandra Kamp and Tim Grobe played the leading roles.

At Christmas 2016, the Scheibner family ensemble (with Petra Milchert and daughter Raffaela) celebrated their twenty-fifth stage anniversary with the program Who takes grandma? ! On the occasion of Hans Scheibner’s 80th birthday, Olaf Scholz , First Mayor of Hamburg, gave a Senate breakfast for him and his friends in the Senate guest house.

Scheibner lived with his second wife Petra Verena Milchert in Hamburg-Ohlstedt . He died there on May 23, 2022 at the age of 85 after a short, serious illness. His final resting place is at the Wohldorf Forest Cemetery in Hamburg.

TV documentary 

• ndr.de: Satire, mockery and stupid stuff – Hans Scheibner , 60 minutes, NDR , first broadcast: May 28, 2022 on NDR Fernsehen , available until May 28, 2023.

Credits: