Frank Weise

Piano, vocals and arrangements

Frank Weise was officially a Deep Purple fan as a child and teenager. Because listening to ABBA as a boy? That wasn’t possible at the time! When he was 14, he bought “Super Trouper”, listened to the record secretly and was blown away.
Almost 40 years later – as an adult and professional musician playing piano, organ, accordion, guitar, bass, drums, flute and harmonica – it is fortunately possible to admit your enthusiasm for ABBA. Especially when in retrospect and from a professional point of view it is clear that the joy in this sound was definitely not a youthful delusion, but very much justified:

“ABBA’s music is timeless! It expresses deep feelings that are just as relevant today as they were then. An example: “The Winner Takes It All” seems like a victory hymn at first glance. But it’s actually a very sad song filled with pain.”

ABBA – initially completely underestimated

Even renowned music journalists only realised years after the great ABBA successes that the compositions with their catchy melodies were musically brilliant and the arrangements highly professional and innovative.

“Benny worked at a Polar Music studio that was experimenting with the latest recording techniques. Several voices were layered over the melody. Although you can’t pick them out individually, the give the sound a very rich texture. Other songs were pitched and played back faster and somewhat higher than the original recording. And he was also one of the lucky ones who owned one of the five highly coveted Yamaha GX-1 synthesisers.”

Grand Fete de la Musique National in Paris, Place de la Defense.
180.000 Zuschauer und 4 Millionen am TV.

“Benny” became his alter ego …

At 16, Frank already had a contract as a church organist, studied Music in Duisburg and Hamburg. Music became his purpose in life. In 2004, he came across ABBA again: A performer to play Benny was wanted for STARS IN CONCERT at the Weststadthalle in Essen…

“When I introduced myself, everyone said the same thing: ‘That’s him!’ I grew into the character, listened to the music again and again, watched the videos countless times, took a deep dive in to the fashion and zeitgeist of the 70s, went on a world tour for several months, and internalised Benny’s style more and more. And at some point, they were right: I was ‘Benny’. At least as my alter ego.”

The golden piano

“ABBA GOLD” – Frank Weise simply took the name of one of the world’s most successful compilation albums literally: He had a golden piano built and is the only professional musician worldwide who plays such a keyboard instrument.
A black version of the Yamaha CP70/80 – the piano Benny played on during his tours – is in his private collection and is also used occasionally.