Culture: Steven Gätjen on the cultural scene: Need to support more

2024-01-13 14:15:17

Culture Steven Gätjen on the cultural scene: Need to support more

Moderator Steven Gätjen is in favor of maintaining nightlife options and calls for more support for culture. photo

© Christian Charisius/dpa

Clubs, concerts, theaters – free culture was hit hard by the corona pandemic. Moderator Steven Gätjen thinks the industry needs more support.

TV-Moderator Steven Gätjen would like more support for the independent cultural scene. It is still noticeable how clubs, concert series and theaters have suffered due to the corona pandemic, the 51-year-old told the German Press Agency. “If you look at how many trades are no longer on the market, and how concert costs for artists are becoming more and more expensive as a result.”

He himself knows professional musicians who were unemployed for a long time during the pandemic and were not supported by the state. “And that is something, especially in these times, that we have to support much more,” said Gätjen yesterday on the sidelines of the live-streamed “Channel Aid” charity concert in Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie, where donations were collected for social projects through clicks became.

In Gätjen’s hometown of Hamburg, the threatened closure of the Molotow music club recently made headlines. The cult club’s rental agreement was terminated because a hotel is to be built on the site in St. Pauli. “The Molotov is of course an institution,” the moderator continued. On the other hand, perhaps a few things would have to change in terms of urban planning. “It’s a discussion, there’s no right or wrong. But there have to be alternatives. And there just has to be an opportunity for young people as well as older people like me to go out and have fun.”

dpa