Published23. January 2024, 4:54 p.m
Switzerland: First yodeling club for gays is looking for new members
It is probably difficult for homosexuals to feel comfortable in the conservative yodeling milieu. That’s why Franz-Markus Stadelmann recently founded the first gay yodelling club in Switzerland.
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Yodeling is a tradition in Switzerland.
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Franz-Markus Stadelmann founded the first gay yodeling club in Switzerland.
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His goal: to offer gays a space in which they can be among themselves.
Stereotypes that come to mind for foreigners when they think of Switzerland: cheese fondue, chocolate, banks and of course yodeling! As a tourist, you like to imagine a group of men and women dressed in traditional costumes standing on an alpine meadow and singing Alpine songs full of pathos out into the mountains.
Do gay yodelers also appear in these performances? Probably not directly, the typical yodeler is probably more traditional and conservative.
What exactly is yodeling?
Yodeling is a specific type of singing without lyrics, but using phonetic syllables. Typical of yodeling is the frequent change between different registers, or to put it simply, different pitches and timbres. Yodeling involves switching between chest and falsetto voices.
Yodeling is particularly widespread in the Alpine region, in addition to Switzerland, for example in parts of Austria, Upper Bavaria and South Tyrol. There are different names for yodeling, for example Dudler in Vienna, You are humiliating or Ludder in Styria or Zäuerli and Ruggusseli in the Appenzell region.
And that’s probably why the well-known yodeler Franz-Markus Stadelmann from Escholzmatt LU recently founded the first yodeling club for gays, which is also open to straight or bisexual men. This is what he reports on SRF.
In the future, anyone interested will be able to discover their voice and yodeling for themselves under the name “Mentreu Yodeling Club”. “We felt the need to make something like this out of a fringe group,” says Stadelmann. It is important to him that gay men can be among themselves sometimes. The idea had been floating around in his head for a long time, and together with his friend Thomas Bachmann, the two of them were able to inspire three other men to do it. Then everything happened relatively quickly.
First rehearsal on January 27th
According to Stadelmann, interest in the newly founded gay yodelling club is quite high, especially in contrast to traditional clubs that have been established for decades. Nevertheless, the five founding members are still looking for other interested people who want to turn the yodelling world upside down with them. Goal: get at least 20 members together.
By the way, being able to yodel is not an admission criterion. In yodeling choirs there are usually only two to three people who yodel, the others sing along “normally”. The first rehearsal will take place on January 27th, from then on every month. But one thing is important to Stadelmann: “We are not interested in making a statement with a pointing finger in the sense of ‘we gays have to stand up for ourselves and are allowed to yodel’.” Rather, he dreams of performing with his yodelling choir at the Federal Yodelling Festival – the next one is scheduled to take place in Basel in 2026.
So if you would like to take part in the Herrentreu yodelling club, you can here report.
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