Hubert Kah
Biography Hubert Kah
Hubert Kah
brought the "Sternenhimmel" (Starry Sky) down to earth for his listeners. With this track, he (along with his band) took first place on the *ZDF-Hitparade*. When host Dieter Thomas Heck announced the results, the crowd erupted in boos—Kah had dethroned the Berlin *Schlager* singer Roland Kaiser. The year 1982 marked a turning point in German pop music. The *Neue Deutsche Welle* (New German Wave) rolled out of the underground (spearheaded by acts like DAF and Abwärts) and into the cultural zeitgeist, storming the charts (with the help of Hubert Kah and Trio).
With "Rosemarie" and, of course, "Sternenhimmel," Kah delivered two of the year's defining songs. The band caused a sensation with their surreal stage costumes—Kah, for instance, would appear in a nightshirt or a straitjacket. The Swabian native’s boyish voice—which always possessed a slightly husky quality—became a quintessential sound of the NDW era. It wasn't until 1983 that Nena and Peter Schilling managed to top this success.
Shortly thereafter, Kah co-wrote the smash hit "Maria Magdalena" for Sandra alongside Michael Cretu, and soon landed another Top 10 single of his own: "Limousine." In the years that followed, working as a songwriter, he helped propel a significant portion of the contemporary German pop scene onto the charts—including acts like Münchener Freiheit, Inker & Hamilton, Two of Us, Peter Schilling, and, time and again, Sandra ("In the Heat of the Night"). On their 1996 album *Goldene Zeiten* (Golden Times), Hubert Kemmler, Markus Löhr, and Rudolf Hirschburger steered their dreamy pop sound out of the NDW's wake; much like bands such as Die Ärzte or Die Toten Hosen, they proved they could thrive without being confined to a specific genre label.
In 2007, Kah appeared as "Kini, the Ice King" in the musical *Prinzessin Lillifee*. In 2014, he made a comeback as the fan favorite "Hubsie" on the reality show *Promi Big Brother*. Quirky, eccentric, and lovable—complete with cool catchphrases and brightly colored sweater vests—Kah won over a new legion of fans there.
He has “no plan, no strategy in life,” Kah remarked in an interview with the broadcaster Sat.1. “The things I do are spontaneous. I don’t think them through. I just kind of do them.” Kah lets his thoughts continue to take flight. Who knows when he might next bring the “starry sky” down to earth…
