Playing permit (GDR)
The player's license was in the GDR the state permission of artists for public appearances. As a rule, no public appearances were allowed in the GDR without this permission.
Terms and synonyms
The terms permission to play , game card , admission as entertainers , performance approval and classification are used as early as the legal basis is partly synonymous. Permission to play stands primarily for entertainers (dance music and discotheques), permission for professional artists (singers, artists, actors) and classification for artistic folk art.
Furthermore, there were some synonyms that are commonly used in musicians' jargon, such as “cardboard”, “amateur cardboard” and “professional cardboard” (the classification cards were made of thick, coarse paper). The official terms were rarely used among musicians.
Legal basis
Each area had its own fee schedule and thus different fee sums. For the first two, the GDR legal gazettes can be viewed here as image files.
The first sentence from the law gazette "Fee regulations for entertainment art" reads as follows: "In implementation of the resolution of November 4, 1970 to enforce order and discipline for services for which fees and charges are paid ..."
De jure , the “classifications” were an assessment of the artistic quality, de facto also an instrument of power for disciplining. They could be withdrawn by order of the state authorities, which amounted to a professional ban. They had to be carried at every performance and could be checked by the organizer. There was also a special event police, which, however, appeared very rarely. Throughout the GDR, the state cultural institutions were informed by circulars that they had been banned from performing.
Performance opportunities
There were the following possibilities to appear in public:
- with a license to play , a license to play , approval as an entertainer , a permit to perform or a classification
- Concerts declared as readings for members of the Writers' Union (up to 180 marks)
- No permission to play was required for appearances in church institutions
- illegal appearances without any permission to play with the threat of a fine of up to 300 marks for artists and organizers, according to § 7 of the fee schedule (see also Ringelfolk )
- Street music was considered an unregistered (i.e. illegal) event
Permission to play
The license to play was for dance and light music. The player's license was in the GDR the state permission for musicians for public appearances. As a rule, no public appearances were allowed in the GDR without this permission.
The basis for the permission to play was the order on the authority to exercise entertainment and dance music of March 27, 1953. It initially only allowed professional musicians to perform in public and was extended to amateur musicians on January 14, 1957. For this purpose, a distinction was made between three different playing permits: a play permit for professional musicians, a play permit for amateurs (play permit for lay musicians and part-time musicians ) and a play permit for disc jockeys ( called record entertainers in GDR jargon ). The playing permits were in turn divided into five different levels, on which the subsequent remuneration for concerts depended: basic level, intermediate level, upper level, special level and special level with concert authorization.
The permission to play for amateur musicians as well as for disc jockeys was granted by the culture department of the district council. For this purpose, the musicians had to prove their skills in front of a state classification committee . The classification committee consisted of district culture officials and music teachers from the music schools. Deviating from this, representatives from a music college were always present at the grading from the graduation to the special level in order to assess and certify expanded musical skills. The musicians had to submit a track list of (at least) 25 songs, of which 60 percent (i.e. 15 songs) should come from their own, domestic or songs of the socialist brother countries and 40 percent (i.e. 10) were allowed to come from the capitalist states ( 60/40 Rule ), some of which the commission selected during the foreplay. From this list, the music group had to perform a half-hour program, which also had to be based on the 60/40 quota rule. In addition, the classification committee specifically asked three other titles in order to check the mastery of the repertoire by random sampling.
The license to play professional musicians was issued by the district council's cultural department .
The gaming permits issued were valid for two years. The musicians then had to be reclassified.
compensation
Public stages were generally only allowed to allow musicians with permission to play. The amount of the remuneration depended on the level set by the classification committee.
The fee was 4 marks for the basic level , 5 marks for the intermediate level, 6.50 for the upper level and 8.50 marks for the special level per hour per musician. In addition, there was a surcharge of 1.50 Marks for the title “Outstanding amateur dance orchestra of the GDR”, which could be acquired at music competitions. The band leader received an allowance of 25 to 50 percent. In addition to the hourly wages, each formation received an expense allowance of up to 70 Marks, depending on the size, and a travel and transport allowance based on the weight of the equipment. If technicians were part of the band, up to two people were paid 30 marks per evening. In order to carry out their work, the assistants needed an assistant's card, which they in turn could apply to the responsible department for culture of the district council.
classification
The classification applied to “artistic folk art”. At the amateur level it was customary to be “tied” to a state sponsoring institution (a kind of guarantor). In his book Badetag , Salli Sallmann describes how, until the mid-1970s, you only received a classification if you belonged to a “bearer” (guarantor). If you lost it, you automatically lost your classification.
The “Cabinets for Cultural Work” were responsible for the classification.
Fee rates
- Amateur level, classification good (18 marks), very good (27 marks), excellent (40 marks), plus "amortization" (for expensive instruments, effect devices, props and costumes)
"Fee schedule for entertainment: admission as a professional artist"
The entertainment fee schedule applied to professional artists such as actors, singers, artists, screenwriters and directors. At the professional level, artists were subordinate to the respective concert and guest performance management (or their affiliated district commission for entertainment art ), through which the contracts ran, even if nothing was brokered by them. Private managers were not provided, but they were common and illegal. Graduates of the music academies automatically received the category “A” professional card after their graduation, otherwise they had to be auditioned in front of a classification committee . The commission consisted of functionaries and artists, the former being in the majority (Appendix 4 / I + II of the fee schedule).
Fee rates
- Professional ID (jargon "Profipappe"), soloists in the categories A - up to 130 marks, B - up to 210 marks, C - up to 380 marks; double that for an evening concert. The Minister of Culture could also set special fees.
- so-called "program classification" (total price of an ensemble including technology and technician costs)
Traveling expenses
According to the travel expenses law, the car kilometer was reimbursed with 0.27 marks, each additional person or 50 kg of luggage with an additional 3 pfennigs.
Basis for professional and performance bans
Admission was withdrawn if "the required social, moral or professional aptitude no longer exists or if the moral feeling or the workers' claims to high artistic quality and humanistic attitude are violated" (Admission Regulations, p. 7, § 4) . Professional and performance bans have been issued for the Renft group , Salli Sallmann , Gerulf Pannach , Stephan Krawczyk , Reinhold Andert , André Greiner-Pol , Akram Mutlak, Dieter Kalka , Werner Bernreuther (limited, for two districts), the Bettelsack group ( from Halle), the Münzenberger Gevattern-Combo (from Quedlinburg). In some cases, the professional bans have been revoked.
literature
- Michael Rauhut : Rock in the GDR. 1964 to 1989. Bonn 2002.
- Thomas Meyer: Musicians between repression and promotion - remarks on the cultural-political system of the GDR. In: Günther Noll (Ed.): Musical folk culture and political power. Conference report Weimar 1992 of the commission for song, music and dance research in the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Volkskunde e. V. (Musical Folklore; Vol. 11). Essen, 1994.
- Olaf Leitner : Rock scene GDR: Aspects of a mass culture in socialism . 1st edition. Rowohlt, Reinbek 1983, ISBN 3-499-17697-1 .
- Salli Sallmann: bathing day.
- Klaus Renft , Undine Materni (ed.): The armament of the nightingale. Diaries.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ The Armament of the Nightingale - Diaries by Klaus Renft
- ↑ Fee schedule for entertainment art, Special Law Gazette 708 of June 21, 1971, signed by the Minister for Culture Gysi, State Publishing House of the GDR, license no. 1538 - 4456/71 Da
- ↑ about half a month's wage
- ↑ For details, see “Fee Regulations for Entertainment Art”, Special Law Gazette 708 of June 21, 1971, signed by the Minister for Culture Gysi, Staatsverlag der GDR, license no. 1538 - 4456/71 Da