The line comes from Schön ist es auf der Welt zu sein, a song recorded in 1971 by German singer Roy Black together with a ten-year-old Norwegian girl, Anita Hegerland, who was already a successful child star in Scandinavia. The song would become one of the enduring popular-culture memories of early-1970s Germany, reaching No. 2 in the German singles charts and remaining in the charts for 33 weeks.

Yet the story behind the song is more interesting than its chart success. It is a small story of European cultural exchange: a German popular singer, a Norwegian child performer, a German film, a multilingual audience and a song whose simple message travelled across borders with remarkable ease.

From Norway to Germany

Anita Hegerland was born in Sandefjord, Norway, and had already established herself as a successful child performer in Scandinavia before she became known to the German public. Her career began at a remarkably young age, and by the time she came to Germany in 1971, she was already an established name in Scandinavian popular culture. She was therefore not an unknown child being introduced to the German entertainment industry. She arrived with a career of her own and with considerable experience as a young performer.
Her German breakthrough came through her collaboration with Roy Black. The contrast between the two performers was striking. Roy Black was one of the best-known German singers of his generation and was particularly associated with the romantic Schlager tradition. Anita was a young Norwegian performer whose presence brought a different energy to the recording. The result was a pairing that might initially have seemed unlikely: a major German male star and a ten-year-old Scandinavian girl singing about the simple happiness of being alive.

The song was written by Lilibert, with music by Werner Twardy and production by Hans Bertram. It was released by Polydor in 1971 and became closely associated with the film Wenn mein Schätzchen auf die Pauke haut, in which Roy Black and Anita appeared together. The film provided an additional platform through which the song reached German audiences and helped establish the pairing in popular culture.

A Norwegian Voice in a German Song

There is something especially revealing about Anita's participation in the recording. She was Norwegian, singing in German, for a German audience, alongside one of Germany's most recognisable popular singers. The song therefore represented a form of cultural crossing at a time when the language of European cultural exchange was far less prominent in public discussion than it is today.

Anita's Scandinavian background was also incorporated into the later life of the song. Roy Black and Anita subsequently recorded Norwegian and Swedish versions, extending the song's journey beyond Germany and into the Nordic countries. The direction of cultural exchange therefore ran in both ways. Anita brought something from Scandinavia into German popular culture, while the German song was subsequently adapted for Scandinavian audiences.

This is one of the small but revealing ways in which popular culture creates connections between countries. Cultural exchange does not always begin with institutions, governments or formal agreements. Sometimes it begins with a song, a film, a performer or a melody that travels from one country to another.

Why the Bee and the Porcupine?

The most memorable image in the song is also its strangest. Why should a bee speak to a porcupine? The two animals seem to belong to entirely different worlds. Yet both are associated with something sharp: the bee has its sting, while the porcupine has its quills. The German word Stachelschwein itself contains Stachel, meaning a spine, thorn or sting.

There is also a simple poetic reason for the pairing. Stachelschwein rhymes naturally with ein and sein, giving the chorus its distinctive rhythm and making the unusual animal combination particularly memorable.

The deeper meaning can nevertheless be read more broadly. The bee and the porcupine are different creatures, yet they “stimmen ein” — they join in, agree and sing together. There is no need to claim that this was necessarily the conscious philosophical intention of the lyricist. There is no reliable evidence that Lilibert explicitly explained the choice of the two animals in those terms. As an interpretation, however, the image has a resonance that reaches well beyond the original children's-song setting.

Different creatures can share a voice. Different languages can carry the same idea. Different countries can participate in the same cultural moment. The unlikely conversation between a bee and a porcupine can therefore be read as a charming metaphor for the possibility of finding common ground across difference.

The Language of Simplicity

The song's message is uncomplicated. The sun shines, people can breathe, walk, see and enjoy the world, and life itself is presented as something worth appreciating. Today, such uncomplicated optimism can sound almost unusual. Yet that simplicity is part of the song's lasting appeal.

There is no complicated political argument and no sophisticated cultural theory. Instead, the song takes something universal — the experience of being alive — and expresses it through the voice of a child. Anita's age mattered. Her youthful voice created a particular contrast with Roy Black's mature and familiar sound. The recording therefore brought together two generations of performers as well as two different cultural backgrounds.

That contrast gave the song an unusual quality. It was neither simply a Roy Black recording nor simply a children's song. It occupied a space between popular entertainment and childhood memory, between Germany and Scandinavia, and between the world of adults and the world of children.

A Moment of European Cultural Exchange

Seen from today's perspective, the story is also a reminder that cultural exchange between European countries has deep roots in popular culture. Anita came from Norway to Germany at a time when European borders remained politically significant and mass cultural exchange was developing through television, cinema, radio and records. Yet music travelled rapidly.

A young Norwegian performer could become familiar to millions of German listeners. A German singer could record versions of a song for Scandinavian audiences. A film could carry a song from the recording studio to cinema screens, while a melody could move between languages without losing its essential message.

This was cultural diplomacy in an informal sense: people encountering another culture through something accessible, emotional and entertaining. No formal diplomatic framework was required. The encounter happened through popular culture, and its audience was the public.

For Berlin Global, this is perhaps the most interesting dimension of the story. Cultural diplomacy is frequently associated with major institutions, international festivals, exhibitions and official programmes. Yet cultural relations between societies are also built through much smaller encounters. Popular music can create familiarity, curiosity and shared memories across national borders.

From a Hit to Cultural Memory

The song reached No. 2 in Germany, entered the charts in August 1971 and remained there until March 1972. It spent 18 weeks in the Top 10 and ranked No. 15 in the German year-end singles chart for 1971. Roy Black and Anita also received major recognition for the recording, including a Goldener Löwe from Radio Luxembourg and a Goldene Schallplatte.

Chart positions, however, only tell part of the story. Cultural memory is created when a song continues to be recognised after its original moment has passed. It survives through recordings, television, family memories and the recollections of people who heard it as children and later introduced it to another generation.

This is particularly important in the case of Schön ist es auf der Welt zu sein. The song belongs unmistakably to the world of early-1970s German Schlager, but its central phrase has outlived the period in which it was created. It has become more than a successful recording. It has become a cultural reference.

Roy Black and Anita: Two Paths Through Memory

Roy Black's career was deeply connected with German popular culture of the 1960s and early 1970s. His songs became part of the musical landscape of the Federal Republic, and his image remains strongly associated with that period.

Anita Hegerland followed a different path. Her career began in Norway and developed across national borders. Her collaboration with Roy Black introduced her to German audiences and created a connection that remained part of her public identity decades later.

The two performers therefore represent two different routes into cultural memory. Roy Black represents an established German popular culture of his time, while Anita represents the movement of culture across borders: a Scandinavian child star entering German popular culture and, in turn, helping carry a German song back towards Scandinavia.

Their meeting was brief in historical terms. Its cultural afterlife was much longer.

Across Generations

There is another reason the song continues to attract attention: it belongs simultaneously to childhood and adulthood. For children, the song is simple and playful. There is a bee, a porcupine, sunshine and an invitation to enjoy the world.

For adults looking back, however, the song becomes something else. It recalls a particular Germany, a particular period of European popular culture and a particular generation of performers. This is how cultural memory works. A song heard by a child in 1971 can become a memory carried into adulthood. Decades later, the same melody can introduce younger listeners to a period they never experienced themselves.

The song therefore travels through generations in much the same way that it once travelled across borders.

What Remains Today

The enduring appeal of Schön ist es auf der Welt zu sein lies partly in its simplicity, but also in the unlikely cultural encounter behind it: a German Schlager star, a Norwegian child star, a song written and produced in Germany, a film and a melody that travelled between languages and countries. At the centre of it all stands one unforgettable image: a bee speaking to a porcupine.

It is a small story, but it illustrates something larger about European culture. Cultural connections are often created through ordinary encounters. They do not always require grand declarations. A song can cross a border. A performer can enter another country's cultural memory. A foreign language can become familiar through melody. And a childhood song can remain meaningful long after the circumstances that produced it have disappeared.

Perhaps that is why the strange conversation between the bee and the porcupine continues to work. They are different, yet they sing together. “Du und ich, wir stimmen ein” — you and I, we join in.

And for a moment, at least, they agree on something very simple: Schön ist es auf der Welt zu sein.

It is beautiful to be in the world.