Klaus Meine, the Scorpions singer who was told by doctors 40 years ago that he would never sing again and is still active

“Look, Klaus, there’s something wrong with your voice. It hurts when I hear you sing & rdquor ;. The diagnosis of Dieter Dierksthe producer of scorpions, He was not a doctor, but his words were devastating for the little singer of the German rock group. Dierks was the band’s right-hand man and an important part of their success in the United States that they had pursued so hard for years. It was not easy for a German group to gain favor and admiration in an eminently Anglo-Saxon market, who viewed a Teutonic band with skepticism and mistrust. The last record work of the scorpions, Animal Magnetism (1980), had brought them notoriety in the American market and now the group had decided to move to a recording studio in France to record their new album. But there, klaus mein, the little vocalist from Hannover, was seen and desired to reach his usual treble. His was a powerful voice, very characteristic, still marked by a German accent that the British market viewed with some suspicion. But both his timbre and his ability to hit high notes made him one of the most promising vocalists in the genre.

However, in the studio, in those days of 1981, something was wrong with him. He began to feel uncomfortable, his vocal chords did not respond to the demanding demand of his new compositions and one day he literally lost his voice. The alarm lights went off in a still young band that was on the threshold of worldwide success, and that album at a point where they were working was the key to finally joining the great hard rock bands on the planet.

Meine flew back to Germany and went to a doctor’s office. This time the diagnosis was professional and it was devastating: “Singer? Change profession & rdquor ;. The spirit of the German vocalist fell into the void and he began to suspect that he would not be able to sing again. In those days he could hardly speak. He returned to the side of his training partners desolate, trying to get used to the idea that there was no other alternative than to leave his passion, music. They tried to cheer him up and convinced him to seek a second medical opinion. The Scorpions vocalist had nodules in his throat. They offered him to go through the operating room and so he did. After a few weeks, he regained his spirits, his voice and returned to the fray.

But it was just a mirage, because it didn’t take long for her to become aware again that her vocal cords weren’t in good condition. He underwent a second surgery, but the problem persisted. So, Klaus Meine fell apart. He addressed the group desolate, depressed, to inform them that he was leaving him, that they should find another singer. And at that moment his partner rudolf schenker, the guitarist who had founded the Scorpions in 1965, told him that he absolutely refused to accept that defeat, that he had to keep fighting and that the group would wait as long as it took. In parallel, the band called Dokken’s singer, Don Dokken, in order to advance in the study. But Schenker’s intention was clear: “We’ll wait for you, Klaus, don’t throw in the towel & rdquor ;.

A VIENNESE DOCTOR

Then, someone recommended Meine to an Austrian specialist who had his practice next to the Vienna opera and treated the best lyrical singers in the world. The Hanoverian singer bit the bullet and went to Austria to see Dr. Kursten. There, on the walls of the waiting room hung portraits of famous opera singers. They had passed through that same place Luciano Pavarotti, Alfredo Kraus, Placido Domingo either Montserrat Caballe, among others. And years later, she would Jose Carrerasafter his illness.

Kursten worked with the Scorpions singer with new clinical methodologies and offered him a second chance. Electrode discharges to the vocal cords, along with other techniques, worked, and in addition, the Viennese speech therapist recommended a former opera singer to complete her recovery. After long sessions of effort, Klaus was recovering her voice and re-educating her. He learned a vital and professional lesson and since then he took pains to take care of his vocal cords. From that serious trance he would try to exercise his voice, treat his throat with greater care and methodically warm up before each rehearsal or performance.

Meine was aware that in his first years of career, even before joining Scorpions, at the time when he began his career in the world of music in The Mushroomsin the mid-60s, or later in Copernicuswith Michael Schenker (Rudolf’s brother), had abused his vocal cords, strumming his voice to perform versions of singers like Elvis Presley either Little Richard, which had marked his musical taste. They were ninety-minute concerts without a break, night after night, forcing her throat, then unconsciously mistreating her.

Despite that, finally his professional career would move forward. After medical sessions, classes and a few months of rest, Klaus Meine was ready to tackle a major challenge: the recording of black outthe album that Scorpions would end up releasing in March 1982, 40 years ago. His voice had gained many qualities. She was more crystalline now, and her vocal range was still enviable. Listening to the songs on that album, nobody could believe that her vocal interpreter had just gone through two operations and a real ordeal. The album was the definitive success of the Germans on the international scene. And Klaus shone on demanding topics like Not One Like You, black out, dynamite or the amazing and dizzying Now.

Later would come new recordings, hundreds of concerts on tours around the entire planet and hits like Rock You Like a Hurricane either still loving you, the latter a classic in the genre of ballads that the band from Hannover has cultivated so copiously and brilliantly. It was precisely the ballads that extended their market to an audience less given to a hard or metal sound. Klaus himself composed the famous Wind of Change after a stay in Moscow in the years before the fall of the Wall. Scorpions was one of the first Western groups to perform in the USSR. A walk through Moscow at the end of the eighties inspired Meine to become a pacifist anthem over the years, although the Russian invasion of Ukraine has led German rockers to change the original lyrics as a sign of disapproval of Putin’s policy .

UNTIL TODAY

It has already rained since 1981, when the Scorpions singer’s career seemed to have come to an end. The unconditional support of his friend Rudolf Schenker, with whom he has participated in all the band’s recordings, from the first, Lonesone Crow (1972), and his persistence in continuing to be what he wanted to be as a child, when lifted onto a stool by his parents he performed the Ave Maria and earned a few coins, they have allowed him reach today active after several decades of frenetic tours and a discography that does not stop growing.

Last February Scorpions released their latest work, Rock Believer (2022). No other title could better define his career and his philosophy of life. After having widely surpassed 50 years of musical career, the Scorpions are these days on tour in the US. Every night, Klaus Meine comes out on stage in his meager six feet and his characteristic black beret, which crowns light eyes, a snub nose and an eternal smile that directs the fans who remain faithful to the stings of the German rock band. most successful in history.

On the back cover of the vinyl of that black out that returned Meine to the path of rock, in the acknowledgments section the name of Doc ‘Vibrator’ Kursten, the doctor who managed to keep the 74-year-old singer today not only a believer in rock, but also a tireless practitioner. And in Vienna, at number 4 of the Opernring, next to the opera, Dr. Reinhard Kursten continues the tradition of his father and keeps open a practice in which, along with the photos of the great opera singers, there is a portrait of Klaus Meine , the singer who refused to shut up.

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