Willkommen Wincent Weiss!

German pop sensation Wincent Weiss performed in the Stuyvesant theater on the evening of December 6, 2018. Prior to his appearance onstage, the auditorium was filled with anticipation and swarms of not only Stuyvesant students, but also students from other schools interested in attending the concert. Once he made his entrance, the audience’s eagerness dissolved into cheering screams as the air crackled with the energy that accompanies live performance music: the vibrations of drum beats that playfully beckon for you to bob your head to the beat, the ground-shaking bass that traverses throughout your limbs, and the vocals that pluck at your heartstrings.

Weiss is currently performing at various schools throughout North America that are involved in the “Schools: Partners For The Future” (PASCH) initiative set by the Goethe Institute, a nonprofit culture association dedicated to promoting study of the German language, awareness of German culture, and fostering of positive relationships and diplomacy between nations. Stuyvesant is a PASCH-involved school, and this concert has enabled students who don’t take German as a language to be exposed to it through the universal art of music.

“I hope this [concert] was an inspiration for everybody to learn German,” Weiss said. He hoped that if he were to perform at Stuyvesant again in the future, students would have a greater likelihood of singing along to his songs in full. This was not to say that the qualities of music that break language barriers were ignored. “The best thing is that you see that just the music counts and just the melodies, and even if the guys don’t understand every word I’m singing in German, they all like dancing and loving,” Weiss said. “This is what makes me really happy: to see German music does this to people even if they don’t understand the lyrics.”

Though he’s currently touring North America, Weiss had never envisioned international ambitions for his career. “I never thought German music would go out of our country borders, so this is a really exciting experience for us,” Weiss said. “But I think I don’t want to be an international star, because one country is really enough for me. It’s really crazy; I’m not the guy who wanted to be in the middle [and who] everybody is crowded around, so one country’s really enough for me.” He chuckled and expressed the irony of his situation, for his growing popularity within his country has caused strangers to recognize and salute him in the street. However, Weiss still enjoys performing outside of Germany. “This is a nice experience for me,” he said.

At the same time, he’s also skeptical of the prospect of his music circulating throughout the globe despite selling out venues in Germany. “I will sing in German, so I think this will not cross the border of Germany,” Weiss said. “But let’s see; if the students like it and share it, maybe we can be here more often and play songs.” Little does he know that students have already been sharing clips of his performance on social media. Stuyvesant kids were particularly overjoyed when Weiss donned Stuyvesant apparel in the middle of the show. Despite becoming overheated, he chose to retain Stuyvesant’s spirit until after he went backstage post-performance.

Regardless of his unwarranted doubts, he has come far from his days of YouTube uploads of acoustic covers. Thanks to the remixing of one of his covers, “Unter meiner Haut” (Under My Skin), by DJ duo Gestört aber GeiL, he gained recognition, and the song received a platinum certification by the Bundesverband Musikindustrie (BVMI), Germany’s equivalent to the Recording Industry Association in America. From there, he has continued to sing for a variety of audiences and will continue to do so for years to come. “The job is lovely. I love to sing,” Weiss said. “I hope to do this for many more years.”

And may he inspire those audiences, too.