Travel: London to Hamburg

David Bowie flew from London to Hamburg on 10 September 1968.

The purpose of the trip was the recording of an appearance on the music TV show 4-3-2-1 Musik Für Junge Leute, made by the ZDF network. He had previously appeared on the show on 27 February 1968.

Bowie filmed his appearance on the show the following day, and returned to England on 26 September. He was accompanied on the trip by his manager Kenneth Pitt.

On September 19 David and I returned to Hamburg for another appearance on Musik für Junge Leute. We stayed at Hotel Eggers, Rahlstedterstrasse 78, which was not far from the ZDF studio. David was to receive DM 800, a little more than £80, and his return air fare. A clause in his contract read, in English, ‘If necessary you are willing to be quite at our disposal as conversation partner for explanatory remarks.’ During our stay I approached Günther Schneider about the possibility of David coming to Germany to do a much more extensive programme and he said that he felt that ZDF would be interested in a half-an-hour colour show. This was encouraging, but I wasn’t very happy about the way in which the Germans were handling colour television, then in its infancy. When David was called for his spot in Musik für Junge Leute I noticed that he could hardly be distinguished from the garish back-cloth and that just about every brightly coloured prop that could be found had been used to dress the set. I said no more to Günther, but began to think how we could produce the show ourselves.