The satirical annual review 2026
A promoter recently said: “The old year is only over for me when Bernd Gieseking has looked back on it from my stage!” For 33 years now, Gieseking has been touring with this special program. He is a cabaret artist and writer, a gifted storyteller, and also a precise satirist, a master of the comic.
All year round, Gieseking keeps track, writes down, notes, analyzes, and comments. In the end, there are 90 minutes of political cabaret, but not only that. It is a unique mix of high politics and personal experiences, with self-ironic reflections alongside found material. He finds seemingly trivialities and makes them big and unforgettable. Gieseking writes from January to December, crowning a face of the month each time, sometimes as an homage, sometimes as an accusation. The audience can look forward to his segments: the legendary calls from various politicians ("Klingeling"), once again commented confusion, the great East Westphalian sage, Gieseking was once again in his regular pub "Fischlounge" in a ridiculous dispute with landlord Herbert and regular guest and poet Karl.
Politics, society, culture, media and press provide him with the keywords for wit and comedy, for grotesque logic and playful nonsense. And again, Gieseking is the reliable chronicler in the chaos of the times. Off we go!
Bernd Gieseking:
A trained carpenter from Minden becomes a cabaret artist, a long and interesting journey. Today, Bernd Gieseking switches between political satire, literary cabaret, and his ridiculous East Westphalian family stories in his stage programs. He is considered the king of year-end reviews and has successfully toured with his stage programs throughout the entire Republic and Switzerland for over 35 years.
His wonderful books "Finne Dich Selbst!" and "Das kuriose Finnland-Buch" and the finale of his Finland trilogy "Finne Dein Glück" are bestsellers, his books "Gefühlte Dreißig - ein Hoffnungskabarett für Männer um die Fünfzig" and his ode to aging parents "Früher hab' ich nur mein Motorrad gepflegt" have reached a large audience, and the corresponding cabaret programs are overflowing with humor and comedy.
The Finns, says Bernd Gieseking, are the East Westphalians of Europe. Conversely, the East Westphalians-Lippers are also special and unique, and the region is full of oddities and peculiarities. Gieseking's book "Das kuriose Ostwestfalen-Buch," published in February 2024, tells exactly that. With this book, he landed on the Spiegel bestseller list.
In September 2025, his latest book "Seepferdchen mit 60 – Bekenntnisse eines sportlichen Spätzünders" was published. In this book, the cabaret artist and bestselling author gathers encouraging texts full of optimism and wit about new beginnings, self-overcoming, Haribo dependency, and the first bath in the ice hole. He summarizes "You can achieve anything if your wife wants it."
In addition, Bernd Gieseking has written numerous children's radio plays, children's books, some plays, and radio features, and has moderated radio programs for WDR, moderated festivals and award ceremonies (including the German Caricature Prize in Dresden and Bremen and the Festival of Comedy, Caricatura Museum Frankfurt), was a radio columnist for HR2, and continues to write columns for daily newspapers, for TAZ Wahrheit and the Mindener Tageblatt. Numerous texts have appeared in anthologies by Reclam and Diogenes, in Satyr Verlag, Edition Tiamat, and Lappan Verlag.
Press on the program:
His satirical annual reviews have become legendary and are a beloved tradition. The man from Minden doesn’t set his punchlines because they want to be funny, but because he often brings unexpected trains of thought to the point. Here, humor does not become an end in itself; his political and social criticism is not a barking for applause, but bites where it can also hurt.
(Philipp Tenta, Neue Westfälische, 11.02.2019)
Photo: Martina Lorenz
Admission: 7 PM
Hallo, ich bin Maya.
