Claudia Jung

Known widely by the moniker Die Große Dame des Deutschen Schlagers, an honor that translates roughly to the Greatest Woman of the German Schlagers, Claudia Jung maintained an extended period of acclaim inside her homeland. She first captured public attention toward the end of the 1980s and proceeded to issue a consistent sequence of well-received albums throughout the years that followed. Over time she cultivated an intensely loyal audience, one strong enough that even after departing her longtime home at EMI—where her presence on the German singles chart vanished for an extended stretch—her full-length projects continued to earn favorable responses. In practice, nearly every album she released climbed inside the German Top 40. Charting singles were no longer essential; year after year her steadfast supporters sustained her work. In addition to earning widespread fan devotion, Jung collected multiple distinguished honors, notably the ECHO-Preise in 1994 and 2000 as well as the Goldene Stimmgabeln in 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, and 2002. At the height of her mid-’90s success, few peers could seriously contest her claim to the title Die Große Dame des Deutschen Schlagers.

She entered the world as Ute Krummenast on April 12, 1964, in Ratingen, a North Rhine-Westphalia municipality situated just beyond Düsseldorf. Even in childhood she displayed a deep affinity for music, performing with her school choir and briefly studying guitar. That interest, however, stayed a personal passion rather than a viable profession, and upon finishing school at eighteen she felt uncertain about any career direction except the one she loved most. Her initial position was as a fotolaborantin, or photo-lab technician. Finding the role unsuitable, she next became an arzthelferin, or dental assistant, yet this too proved untenable because she could not tolerate the sight of blood. The so-called “phase der selbstfindung,” or phase of self-discovery, yielded little progress, prompting her to escape persistent inquiries from relatives and acquaintances by suspending the question of her future altogether. She relocated to Italy, where she worked at a travel agency, performed with hotel show bands, and gained broader perspective on herself and her surroundings. After a formative year abroad she returned to Germany and accepted an office position that suited her reasonably well.

Her musical ambitions received decisive encouragement in 1984 when she was introduced, through mutual contacts, to producer Adam Schairer. He arranged for her to cut several demonstration recordings in a Cologne studio, after which, with assistance from the successful hitmaker Jean Frankfurter—also known by his birth name and songwriting alias Erich Liessmann—she prepared the foundation for her earliest singles: “Immer Wieder Eine Handvoll Zärtlichkeit” (1986), “Träume Sterben Nie” (1987), and “Amore, Amore” (1987). All three tracks appeared on her debut album, Halt’ Mich Fest (1988), the first of numerous releases issued by Electrola/EMI, among them Etwas für die Ewigkeit (1989), Spuren Einer Nacht (1990), Wo Kommen die Träume Her (1991), Du Ich Lieb’ Dich (1992), Claudia Jung (1994), Sehnsucht (1995), Winterträume (1996), Augenblicke (1997), and Für Immer (1999). Her decade-long association with EMI concluded with the retrospective Best Of (2002), which assembled nineteen of her major successes for the label, most prominently “Stumme Signale” (1989), “Schmetterlinge” (1991), “Du, Ich Lieb’ Dich” (1992), “Das Dunkel der Nacht” (1993), “Lass Mich Doch Nochmal” (1993), “Je T’aime Mon Amour” (1994), “Wer Die Sehnsucht Kennt” (1995), and “Domani l’Amore Vincera” (1996).

By that point Jung had already advanced her career by signing with Polydor/Universal and delivering Auch Wenn Es Nicht Vernünftig Ist (2001), her inaugural album for the new label and her first studio project in two years. The following year she transferred to Koch Universal—another Universal subsidiary distinct from the independent U.S. Koch operation—and Auch Wenn Es Nicht Vernünftig Ist appeared again with fresh artwork and expanded material. Seelenfeuer (2003) came next and proved a modest setback, becoming her first album in more than ten years to miss the German Top 40; moreover, it faced immediate competition from the additional EMI compilation Schlager & Stars (2003), issued only a month later. The pattern of releases from both her former and current labels persisted: Herzzeiten (2004), a Koch Universal effort containing several re-recorded Electrola-era hits, was countered by Essential (2005), a sixteen-track EMI anthology that presented the original versions. Träumen Erlaubt (2006) marked her subsequent Koch Universal outing and, like most of her albums, performed dependably, remaining on the chart for months and entering the Top 40. At this stage of her career her albums arrived with the regularity of daybreak, yet she had not produced charting singles comparable to those of the mid-’90s until the arrival of “Sommerwein, Wie die Liebe Süß und Wild” (2007), a duet with Nik P. that became her first single to reach the charts since “Lieb’ Mich Nochmal” a decade earlier.