Hamburg - Gruenspan

Hamburg is the second largest city by population in Germany and the second smallest German state by area.

"Hammaburg" was the name of a castle, that Charlemagne commissioned here between the River Alster and the River Elbe. In 1189 Frederick I (aka "Barbarossa") granted Hamburg freedom from customs duties for ships sailing the Elbe from Hamburg to the North Sea.

So the the second largest port in Europe developed here - and just near to the harbour the "Reeperbahn", where once ropes (reep = rope) were produced. Today the area is a centre of Hamburg's nightlife and as well a red-light district.

"Gruenspan", situated in Grosse Freiheit, next to the Reeperbahn, is a music club, founded in 1968. In the early 70s, "Gruenspan" was a place to be, similar to "Paradiso" in Amsterdam.

www.gruenspan.de/

Indra, the music club to the left, is the place, where the Beatles performed on 18 August 1960, just a day after they had arrived from Liverpool. At that time a hen it was a five-piece band with Pete Best was on drums and Stu Sutcliffe on bass. Sutcliffe left the Beatles, enrolled in the Hamburg College of Art, but died in Hamburg from an aneurysma on 10 April 1962.

indraclub64.de/