Oldies Revival Band

Oldies Revival Band's own history page traces 3 names across the same stage, and the site frames its most recent one as a rebirth of something older. "Die Oldies Revival Band aus dem Raum Bern ist im Jahr 2000 aus dem 'Jokers Sextett Bern' hervorgegangen," the homepage says: the band emerged from the Jokers Sextett Bern in the year 2000. That sextet was itself a rename. 3 teenagers from Bümpliz, Jürg Probst, Christoph Lenz and René Maring, started a trio called The Jokers in 1968. 2 more musicians, a horn player and a keyboardist, joined in 1976, and the trio grew into the 6-piece Jokers Sextett Bern, which spent what the band's own biography page counts as the next 24 years working dance halls around Bern: the Buurepinte in Ammerzwil, the Chlösterli in Gstaad, the National and Happy Light rooms in Bern, and large private parties. As the circuit shifted toward village fairs, later bookings added the Schopffest in Oberbottigen, the Bärn-Wescht Fescht and the Bümplizer Chiubi. When the ballroom-dance halls closed for good in the late 90s, the band trimmed back to 5 players, dropped the ballroom repertoire it had built its name on, and turned exclusively to rock and pop oldies, taking the name Oldies Revival Band with the new millennium.

3 of today's 5 members go back to that first gig in 1968. Jürg Probst plays lead guitar and lead vocals and still handles the band's bookings; the band's own page credits him as a founder of The Jokers alongside René and Christoph. Christoph Lenz plays bass and sings, and looks after the band's admin and press. René Maring plays drums and sings, and his bandmates describe him as the group's rhythm anchor. The 2 later arrivals have also been aboard for decades. Rolf Koradi plays keyboards and guitar and sings lead; he joined the Jokers Sextett Bern in 1981 and now runs the band's technical side and its website (his own bio jokes that he hails from "Steinbock-Land"). Fritz Stalder plays saxophone, flute and keyboards; he joined in 1976, left for a stretch with an outfit called Cocktail Band, and returned in 1981. His bio notes that his tenor sax "hat übrigens den gleichen Jahrgang, wie er selbst", is the same vintage he is.

The band describes its own sound on the homepage as a "handgemachte, fetzige Sound," a handmade, punchy sound, delivered by what it calls "die aufgestellten fünf Jungs," the 5 lively guys, built to captivate "jung und alt gleichermassen," young and old alike. The pitch runs from the 60s to the 80s, decade by decade: the "Roaring Sixties," the "Rocking Seventies" and "The Eighties," framed on the homepage as the era that made the Beatles and the Rolling Stones into what they became. The published song list backs that up with real detail rather than a genre label: 74 titles, weighted toward international staples (5 by the Eagles, 3 apiece from the Rolling Stones and Supertramp, 2 each from the Shadows, Fleetwood Mac, Smokie and Status Quo) next to a genuine vein of Bernese dialect rock, 5 songs by Polo Hofer and 2 by Patent Ochsner among them, plus 1 apiece from Rumpelstilz and Span. A double CD called "MUSIGBOX" carries its own set of audio samples on the site, and a couple of those, "Too Little Too Late" and "Maggie May," don't appear on the printed set list at all.

On 3 November 2018, the band marked what it calls its 50th "Bühnen-Jubiläum," 50 years on stage, dated back to the 1968 founding, with a show at the Sternensaal in Bümpliz. The band's own media archive independently dates a second anniversary too: a photo caption reads "11.11.2023: 55-jähriges Musik Jubiläum im Sternen Detiligen mit Tanz zu Rock- & Pop-Hits," placing a 55-year music anniversary at the Sternen in Detligen on 11 November 2023. 2 separately captioned events, 5 years apart on the calendar, both point back to the same 1968 start.

A dated 2026 calendar, and what fills it

The band's Shows page runs a "Serviceliste" of 2026 dates rather than a vague promise of availability: a private snow party in Lenk on 28 February, a private benefit event at Schloss Burgdorf on 28 March, an "Oldies Wunschkonzert" (an oldies request concert) at Jouni's Restaurant in Jegenstorf on 25 April, Belpfest starting at 22:00 in the Einstellhalle on 16 May, the SEGA trade fair in Seftigen with live music in the festival tent from 20:30 on 20 June, the 7th Hoschtet-Fescht on 18 July with its capacity stated as limited, the Bundesfeier (national day) at the Festplatz Paul Klee in Münchenbuchsee on 31 July, and a return date at Jouni's Restaurant on 31 October with details still to follow. The media archive backs the calendar with a real history rather than just this year's bookings: gigs and shows dated to 2016 (the Brügglibar in Thun), 2018 (the 50th anniversary), 2023 (the Detligen anniversary), and 2024 (a private event at the Bierhübeli in Bern on 30 November, and a filmed set at the Bern-West Fest).

None of this, not the 2026 calendar, not the media captions, not the homepage or the contact page, uses the word "wedding" anywhere. What the site does establish is a working 5-piece band with a full year of named, dated private parties, a benefit event, a restaurant residency and public and trade festivals booked well in advance, the kind of running gig list a couple can actually check rather than take on faith.

A rider for someone else's PA, and a booking form with no price attached

The band's media page carries a downloadable technical rider and stage plan, described on the site as applying "falls das PA-Beschallungssystem und die Lichtanlage durch den Veranstalter gestellt wird," if the PA system and lighting are supplied by the event organizer. Nothing on the site says what the band brings along when a venue doesn't already have a system in place, and there's no published travel radius or callout fee either.

Booking runs through a plain contact form on the Kontakt page: "Für eine unverbindliche Anfrage kontaktieren Sie uns," contact us for a non-binding enquiry. The page names 2 contacts under "Management," Jürg Probst and Rolf Koradi, both reachable by phone, with Probst's address given as Bottigenstrasse 275 in 3019 Oberbottigen, the same corner of Bern the band's own history traces its roots to. There's no price published anywhere on the site, no package list and no minimum booking length; the entire commercial side of the operation runs through that one form. The site is German throughout, biography, band bios, songs, shows, media and contact pages alike, with no language switcher and no English version anywhere in the navigation. Nothing is published about what language the band's stage announcing or its booking correspondence would run in.

What the site adds up to is a long, checkable paper trail rather than a sales pitch: 3 of 5 current members present since the first gig in 1968, 2 independently dated anniversaries pointing at the same origin, a 74-song list running from the Eagles to 5 songs by Polo Hofer, and a full year of named, dated 2026 bookings rather than a claim of availability. Reach them through the same plain enquiry form everyone else does, since nothing here comes pre-priced or packaged in advance.