Biography

Dieter Schneider was born on March 10, 1937 in Berlin, Germany. Dieter is known for Don't Cheat, Darling! (1973), Carlos (2010) and Aber Doktor (1980). Dieter was married to Monika Herz and Ilka Lux. Dieter died on September 22, 2023 in Berlin, Germany.

Working always on a freelance basis, in the end he produced approximately 3,000 song lyrics, set to music by around 200 composers. Inevitably plenty of them were "bread and butter" texts, written because he needed the money, but his overall output also included many well known hits, performed by East Germany's new generation of popular singers.

By many criteria he was the most successful lyricist in the German Democratic Republic between 1955, when he wrote his first song-text, and 1990.

Schneider was a German lyricist, specialising in 'Schlager music'.

For nearly ten years Dieter Schneider was the editor in charge of the popular "sailors' series", Klock 8, achtern Strom, transmitted from the East German Television studio at Rostock, a ninety minute "feel-good" Schlager music show (which some western commentators thought flagrantly copied its format from equivalent West German television programmes).

Dieter Schneider won the "Golden Orpheus" prize in Bulgaria and the "Bratslava Lyre" prize in Czechoslovakia. Closer to home he was a winner of the National Arts Prize (Kunstpreis) of the German Democratic Republic.