Lennart Schilgen - Abwesenheitsnotizen

Abwesenheitsnotizen. Songs & Poems

Always being reachable? That's so yesterday. Lennart Schilgen is back with his third show - and makes his mark precisely by being absent. When he's not giving concerts or picking up cabaret prizes (Prix Pantheon, Stuttgarter Besen, and more), he's mainly doing one thing: making himself scarce. He goes on cycling trips, retreats to a monastery, visits a communist summer camp. Or simply drifts into the depths of his own thoughts, which is often adventure enough.

Out of these detours - through the world and through his own head - came songs. Light and witty, yet unafraid to linger in darker corners. This time Schilgen digs out things that have been swept under the rug for years: an old PUR cassette, primary school report cards, the story of a night-bus stop. Fortunately, he guides his audience safely over every abyss - carried by his accomplished piano and guitar playing, his voice, and what the jury of the "Tuttlinger Krähe" award called "a sharp mind, heart, humour, and treacherous punchlines".

And if all else fails, there are always the poems: small linguistic surprise packages, deeply silly and highly crafted at the same time. His recently published "Gesammelte Werke" - if a little bragging is permitted here - is something of a bestseller by poetry-collection standards.

Questions? Feel free to email him any time. He just won't reply. So: best to come to the concert directly.

Photo: Marvin Ruppert