Freddy Quinn is 90: A Hamburg boy from Austria

It happened at the beginning of the 1950s in a Hamburg harbor bar. There, in the “Washington Bar” on St. Pauli, a young man was sitting at the bar, singing hillbilly songs and international folklore to the guitar.

In addition to seamen and women from the horizontal trade, a reporter was also present – Jürgen Roland, a later legend of the North German Broadcasting Corporation (1925-2007, “Stahlnetz”). That gave the talented singer his first TV appearance. And a superstar was born: Freddy Quinn. This is what the young man called himself with longing in his powerful baritone voice. And he quickly rose to become one of the greatest entertainers in post-war West Germany.

“Homesickness”, “Burning hot desert sand”, “Boy, come back soon” or “The guitar and the sea” were the wistful hits with which the always neat “Freddy” hit the Germans busy with the reconstruction of their country Heart met. He sold more than 60 million records by the turn of the millennium. He received more than a dozen gold records and was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit in 1984.

Freddy Quinn has withdrawn from the public eye

Now the entertainer, who also caused a sensation as a circus performer and actor, is 90 years old. On this Monday he can celebrate a milestone birthday. However, it is unknown whether he does this in Hamburg or elsewhere – because Quinn has long since withdrawn from the public eye.

The model sailor, not a Hamburg native by birth, but Austrian, has been a person shrouded in mystery throughout his life. There are several versions of his biography. He was born as Manfred Franz Eugen Helmuth Nidl on September 27, 1931. According to Quinn, his father was a merchant of Irish descent who had died in 1943 in the USA, where his son was looking for him after the end of the war. “That was the first time I learned what real soul pain is,” the star later explained. Adventurous journeys took him to Algeria, where he sang in front of the Foreign Legionnaires. There was also a stepfather, for a while his name was Manfred von Petz. He was later officially allowed to change his name to Quinn.

The heartthrob was also covered with his love life. Lilly Blessmann, whom he had called his manager for decades, died in 2008 at the age of 89. The marriage of the two had only become known through a court case in 2004, when Quinn had to deal with the allegation of tax evasion – admitting the crime and paying off his debts. “She was my good star,” said Freddy of Lilly. The unforgettable show man is now happy with his partner Rosi, who is almost 30 years younger than him, as he said in one of his rare interviews in 2019 with “Bild”. Both liked to travel – as far as Asia and Africa. And at home he likes to repair old clocks. In 2006 Quinn had admitted to the media protocol: “I was almost amused when people spread the word that I was gay.”

Appearances with world stars like Johnny Cash

The show’s size has also formulated distanced views on his profession. “I am a service provider and I orient myself towards what people ask of me,” he once summed up. Quinn got into trouble in 1966 when he directed the song “We” against the then emerging youth protest movement, including its hippies and “bums”. Quinn appeared in his singing career with world stars like Johnny Cash and Nana Mouskouri. He only missed international success by a hair’s breadth, because the composer Bert Kaempfert originally intended Quinn to receive the Al-Martino title “Spanish Eyes”. At home it also made a big splash in the cinema: “The Big Chance” was the title of a music film in 1957 in which he portrayed a student in Heidelberg who earned an extra income with his band. The prelude to 13 Freddy films up to 1971.

Hamburg’s Senator for Culture, Carsten Brosda (SPD), paid tribute to Quinn shortly before his 90th birthday as a legend whose career is second to none. “Badly shaken by fate and the course of history at a young age, he was discovered in Hamburg in the 1950s. He always felt particularly comfortable in the Hanseatic city and has been at home here for many decades,” Brosda told the German press agency . From Hamburg he brought a touch of the big wide world into the living rooms of his fans in the more than 60 years of his career with his well-known hits. “Not only as a musician, but also as an actor, presenter and circus artist, he inspired the entire republic.”

As a theater actor, his fans cheered him on, among other things, at more than 600 performances of the musical “Heimweh nach St. Pauli” on German stages. Quinn’s very special love seems to belong to the artistry, as he showed it on television in programs like “Stars in der Manege”. He had learned his skills on the high wire and as a tamer when he joined a traveling circus at a very young age. “The time at the circus was the most important lesson in my life,” said Quinn, recalling these beginnings.