I have just discovered the first German Sophie fansite on the net so far. The link is www.sophie-zelmani.de . But don´t be afraid, Rindert and Elske. The site is very small and in my opinion it´s not really becoming a alternative to your perfectly managed and always up-to-date site (even not for German speaking Sophie fans).
I see it very positively, because I think it´s a hint, that Sophie gains more and more respect, that she deserves, in my country. Even though she never entered the German charts (and those of other European countries) so far, Sophie´s music gets more and more attention from very important German newspapers. When the "Decade of Dreams" album was released, even the online edition of the "BILD-Zeitung", the most important German "yellow-press" newspaper (even though most Germans say they don´t like the paper, allmost everyone is reading it ) was recommending the album. Our state television (ARD) was also recommending the album in it´s teletext (as one of only two albums they are introducing every week).
Another hint for Sophie´s growing success may be the fact, that she seems becoming very successfull within the German online community. She may never enter the official German charts. But the biggest and most important German online store "Amazon" has got it´s own charts. And there the "Decade of dreams" album were listed for about 2 or 3 weeks within the Top 100. That´s not that bad for an artist who really does not like to promote herself that much. Another CD store "jpc" (it´s not only a online store) also has got it´s own charts. It´s much smaller than "Amazon" but much more specialized on singer/songwriters and "traditional music". Believe it or not, but there the "Decade of Dreams" album was, when introduced, album of the week and it really was number one for 1 or 2 weeks.
We allready had the discussion about the pros and cons of Sophie becoming more and more famous in another topic. Now, considering all that I mentioned, I would say, that Sophie allready has a kind of popularity at least here in Germany. But the popularity only is within a special kind of "older" (I will not say more wise - that would be to arrogant
) listeners. These kind of listeners aren´t, of course, so important for the industry as younger, teenage, listeners. But that, of course, must not be bad at all. Markus
Let's see how it develops. Perhaps the authors are interested in a kind of cooperation with Rindert and Elske (in sharing information, establishing a closer contact to this forum etc. , who knows). Could be the first step to establishing a kind of "Sophie Network". I my opinion, this would be a great thing for her fans, what do you think?
