The pioneers of the Erdinger stadium announcers

Created: 11/12/2022, 1:00 p.m

By: Dieter Priglmeir

Dieter Priglmeir © hep

If you are good, you can even refuse to play the club song.

We've known that since the 1990s.

Please do not feed!

Jokers once hung a sign like this in front of the announcer's booth in the Eisstadion in Erding.

And rightly so, who knows how the trio would have escalated.

And with that, welcome to part 2 of our stories about the special species known as the "stadium announcer".

Beginning with the Crazy Ducks.

That's the name of the ice hockey fan club, in which Patrick Tischer, Mike Lechner and Thomas Kahl were also at home before they revolutionized the announcements in the ice rink.

Where previously two-minute penalties were announced, as at the train station, EAV's Falco Amadeus parody (“You have to know when to leave”) was now playing.

Or if someone from both teams had to go to the penalty box, Peter Rubin sang: "We two are going somewhere." When goals were conceded, it was Gitte's turn: "Don't be too happy!" "And if there's a fight on the ice, we have Rocky -played the classic 'Eye of the Tiger',” Thomas Kahl remembers.

Once the referee let it be known "that we shouldn't exaggerate," he says.

"But actually everyone loved us - including the opponents." For example, the touched fans from Weißwasser, "because we played the Puhdys".

Weißwasser in Erding?

Yes, we're talking about the 1990s, when the puck hunters were still called "Erding Jets" and there were 3,000 spectators in the stadium against Deggendorf.

And when there was no Spotify or Deezer.

For Thomas Kahl, that was the "Musicworld" shop that was opposite his garage "and where I was allowed to borrow all the CDs".

And then the work began for him: finding the individual sequences and recording them on music cassettes, which he then had burned onto CDs by a specialist in Taufkirchen.

Ultimately, the trio had around 150 music sequences on two CDs.

“But since we had two CD players available, you had to have quick fingers depending on the situation and hit the search button to find the right snippet of what was happening in the game.

Our Mike mastered it brilliantly,” says Kahl.

The roles were divided: Tom, the music sniper, quick-finger Mike and Patrick Tischer, "the best stadium announcer in the world", as Thomas Kahl puts it.

"And I mean that seriously.

It's unbelievable how Patrick had the people under control and heated up the mood." That's why he once got a call from the association.

"It was a subpoena.

Patrick was supposed to go to a stadium announcer course.” What Tischer didn't know: “The call was a phone joke from Radio Arabella, which was then also broadcast.” Threaded by his dear colleagues.

"He was a bit grumpy there," says Kahl with a grin.

The ice hockey department management was also offended.

The crew had recorded a song: "We are the Jets".

Kahl: “That was horrible.

We played it once and then refused.

They weren't so happy there, but apart from that we were allowed to do what we wanted."

As a general rule, stadium announcers should not be interfered with when it comes to music selection.

Even Wartenberg's Franz Dellel got angry.

The Bon Jovi fan took on older people who wanted Bavarian marching music and not this noise.

"He wasn't kidding and threatened to resign," says Thomas Rademacher, who always sits next to him, ticks and operates the scoreboard - and regularly sweats because Mr. Dellel "only shows up completely relaxed 15 minutes before the game and then have one or the other technical discussion".

By the way: The folk music thing isn't always a bad idea.

Lukas Wetzel relied on brass band music at the home game of TSV Dorfen against Rosenheim this year because the game took place during the Dorfen folk festival.

So when we walked in, "Auf der Vogelwiese" and other very proper things ran.

He had chosen “40 Years of the Flippers” as goal music.

"And because we won 7:1, it was a continuous loop," remembers his brother and sporting director of TSV, Markus Wetzel.

"People liked it, we'll do it again next year." We hope: both!

So hearty music - and win 7:1.

also read

Erding Gladiators win 6-0 in Pfaffenhofen

We want to close with the early days of stadium announcership.

We remember Georg Harrer, President of TSV Erding in the 1960s, who disappeared into his changing room in the top corner of the stand with a complete record collection and then hung up.

A classic: "What does a skier need?" He always played that.

Even in midsummer.