The quietest party in town

Dies ist die eng­li­sche Übersetzung, lies den ursprüng­li­chen Artikel hier!

All stu­dents in Halle know about the Palette, the Charles Bronson, and many have joi­ned a first-year club crawl at least once. Meanwhile, the idea of a Silent Disco may not be on everyone’s radar. This should change!

When my part­ner had first asked me to join her and her par­ents for the Silent Disco, cal­ling me scep­ti­cal would have been an under­state­ment. I fea­red the who­le affair might be a bit too quiet for my tas­te. The idea couldn’t get me in a pro­per par­ty mood. In the end, they tal­ked me into com­ing along anyway.

Sound of Silence

On a hand­ful of days per year, the doors of the Schaufenster at the Neues Theater in the Große Ulrichstraße open from 10pm to around half past mid­ni­ght. At the ent­ran­ce, ever­yo­ne is sup­plied with head­pho­nes becau­se that is the only way you will hear the music. On the far side there’s a bar. Otherwise, the small space is most­ly dedi­ca­ted to the dance floor. To the left and the right, a total of three DJ desks are set up.

When the par­ty starts and the head­sets are tur­ned on, you can choo­se from the “chan­nels” of the three artists throughout the evening, who may play qui­te diver­se gen­res depen­ding on the the­me of the night. An adjus­ta­ble dial on the head­pho­ne lets you flip bet­ween blue, red, and green. From pop to rap and elec­tro­nic beats, not­hing is off limits, not even some wild “medi­eval remix” ver­si­ons of popu­lar hits.

The con­cept, which in my own igno­ran­ce I assu­med to be qui­te novel, has been around in various pla­ces across the world for more than 20 years. Whether in London, Berlin, or Singapore, crowds of various sizes enjoy them­sel­ves at Silent Discos everywhere.

Rhythm is a Dancer

From the out­side, it may be a litt­le odd to see almost four dozen peop­le with a func­tio­n­al head­dress move around to dif­fe­rent rhyth­ms, all in near com­ple­te silence. Every now and then someo­ne dares to sing along to the lyrics – after all, next to nobo­dy will hear it.

But once I got used to swit­ching at will through the DJs and sim­ply enjoy­ing the music as if I were lis­tening to it at home, I stop­ped fee­ling awk­ward. As a pas­sio­na­te club­ber, I love it when we dance as a group and scream to the finest 2000s ban­gers until our voices get ras­py. This fee­ling of cohe­si­on is actual­ly not some­thing I miss at the Silent Disco.

While each guest is most­ly enjoy­ing the evening on their own, they are still in com­pa­ny. If you dis­li­ke a song, the­re is no need to escape to the smoker’s cor­ner – you can sim­ply turn the dial. And should you stumb­le upon a par­ti­cu­lar­ly good song, just make eye con­ta­ct with your friends and tip your head­pho­nes so they can see the chan­nel they should tune in.

Everyone’s a Star!

One noti­ce­ab­le dif­fe­rence from typi­cal par­ties is the average age of the dan­cing crowd: from stu­dents and workers of all age groups to agi­le reti­rees – the Silent Disco is for ever­yo­ne, as it should be. When the lights come back on at 12:30 am, nobo­dy needs to worry about mis­sing out on sleep. The choice of drinks is total­ly suf­fi­ci­ent but won’t lead to a han­go­ver. The mode­ra­te size of the floor and the crowd add to the plea­sant ambi­ence – without any squee­zing and shoving.

Combined with the cli­en­te­le found in the Schaufenster, the­se con­di­ti­ons ensu­re that fema­le-read and queer peop­le can have a rela­xing time. The risk of being inap­pro­pria­te­ly approa­ched or gene­ral­ly annoy­ed by ine­bria­ted men is prac­ti­cal­ly zero here.

Are you loo­king for a cosy, laid-back alter­na­ti­ve to the estab­lis­hed club sce­ne in Halle with an “after-work” atmo­s­phe­re? Then the Silent Disco just might be the thing for you.

Translation: Konrad Dieterich