Germany's Only Americana Festival · Founded in Oberhausen · Since 2016
The antidote to container culture.
A festival built on love for music, community, and something real.
10th Anniversary · Zentrum Altenberg, Oberhausen · €27,500+ to MSF
Americana · Folk · Alt-Country · Roots Rock · Honky-Tonk · Country-Soul
10
Years going strong
2016
founded in Oberhausen
*****
International Press
€27.500
Raised For MSF / DWB / ÄoG
1
Festival Like This in Germany
This Year's Festival · 10th Anniversary Edition
"Chasing the shiver since 2016" - the anniversary edition comes home to Zentrum Altenberg
10. & 11. July 2026 · Zentrum Altenberg · Oberhausen
12 Artists · 2 Days · Limited Capacity
10
Artists Announced - 2 TBA
Ben de la Cour · Irish Mythen · Vandoliers · Emily Nenni · Julianna Riolino · Jerry Joseph & The Dimpker Brothers · Kirsten Adamson · Leeroy Stagger · Jesper Lindell · Joana Serrat
9 July
Welcome Night - The Southern Fold
The night before the festival. JuBB, Essen-Werden. Album release party. €15 advance. Book your ticket...
Our Story
In 2016, Dietmar Leibecke found himself at a confluence of milestones: a 50th birthday, 25 years of marriage, a decade of promoting live music, and - most profoundly - a kidney transplant from his wife. Rather than conventional celebrations, the decision was to do something that reflected what truly mattered: music, community, and giving back.
What began as a personal celebration became something much larger. The inaugural Static Roots Festival was held at Zentrum Altenberg in Oberhausen, a former industrial church complex in the heart of the Ruhrgebiet, and was immediately voted one of the three best Americana music festivals in the world by LonesomeHighway.com readers (alongside AmericanaFest Nashville and Kilkenny Roots Festival).
Ten editions later, every early bird ticket has sold out. The international press has run out of superlatives. Artists keep coming back. And the community - from Oberhausen, from across Germany, from Ireland, the UK, the US & Canada, from everywhere - keeps finding its way here every July.
HOW THE NAME WAS BORN
While working as a Software Engineer, Dietmar came across an ESA article about data transmission from space - and the techniques used to minimise static noise that causes data errors. The word "static" stuck. Combined with the roots festival tradition (Kilkenny Roots, Take Root, ...), it became Static Roots. A festival named after a space agency's signal problem. That felt right.
Every Festival Friday · Before The Music Begins
On the Friday morning of every festival, before a single note is played on the main stage, a small group of festival-goers meets at Oberhausen Hauptbahnhof and sets off into the Ruhrgebiet together. This is the Static Ruhr Tour - a curated half-day journey through one of Europe's most extraordinary regions.
The Ruhrgebiet was shaped by two centuries of migration, industry, and reinvention. People came here from Poland, Italy, Turkey, Greece, and Spain: they came to find work, and they brought their cultures with them. That spirit of mix and welcome feels immediately familiar to anyone who has spent time at the Static Roots Festival.
Each year the destination is different. A UNESCO World Heritage colliery. A ferry through the world's largest inland harbour. An industrial landscape turned nature park. A 19th-century industrialist's mansion. A 1920s cinema palace. And every year, something unexpected happens: a festival artist joins the group and plays a short, intimate set somewhere along the way, before the weekend has properly begun.
The tour returns to Oberhausen in the early afternoon, in time for the festival gates to open. By then, a group of strangers has quietly become something more. That is what the Static Ruhr Tour has always been - the moment the Static Roots community starts to form.
Pelf Metersen (Melf Petersen) has captured each tour destination in a series of original postcard prints - vivid, minimal, unmistakably Ruhr. Available at the festival merch stall and on Bandcamp, with all proceeds going to Doctors Without Borders.
Year-Round Concerts
The festival is two days. The music doesn't have to be. Static Roots Presents brings Americana artists to intimate venues across the Ruhrgebiet year-round - extending the spirit of the festival into every season.
Past Shows in the Static Roots Presents series
Chuck Prophet & His Cumbia Shoes (2025) · Jesper Lindell & Brunnsvik Horns (2024) · Chuck Prophet (2024) · Jesse Malin · Silver Lining · Jesper Lindell (2023) · The Hanging Stars · Bywater Call · Jerry Joseph
Side Project - TRESOHR STUDIOS, Oberhausen
Born in the heart of Oberhausen, the Static Roots Sessions bring the spirit of the festival into the legendary TRESOHR Studios - where analogue warmth meets digital precision. International talents and local legends step off the festival stage and into an intimate recording space.
The result: honest performances that capture the raw magic of roots music. A growing archive of unforgettable sessions - each one a different artist, a different story, a different reason to love this music.
A Stage Beyond The Stage
These recordings help artists book gigs, reach new fans, and build momentum. Supporting artists is at the core of what Static Roots does.
Professional Quality
World-class studio sound and multi-camera filming. A career tool and a keepsake, long after the festival weekend.
Tresohr Studios
For over a decade, Oberhausen's creative heartbeat. "We move people with music and sound." Now the home of the Static Roots Sessions.
Free For Artists
Every festival artist is invited to record 3–4 songs at TRESOHR Studios - filmed and produced at no cost to them.
Music With A Mission
The Static Roots Festival is non-commercial and independent. It has been from the very first day. And since that first day in 2016, every single euro spent on festival merchandise has gone directly to Médecins Sans Frontières / Ärzte Ohne Grenzen - providing life-saving emergency medical care in conflict zones and humanitarian crises around the world.
No percentage kept. No admin fee. When you buy a hoodie, a water bottle, a tote bag at the Static Roots merch stand, the money doesn't go into a budget. It goes to MSF. It has always been that way. It always will be.
Thanks to the extraordinary generosity of the community that has gathered in Oberhausen year after year - from Germany, from Ireland, from the UK, from across the world - over €27,500 has been raised and donated since 2016. That number grows every year.
This is not a marketing angle. It's what this festival believes in. Acting on values, not just naming them.
What the community says
TEN YEARS OF
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