left politics. He is conjointly a lawyer, presence the pedantic arcdegree of Doc of Law.

After perusal law from 1952 to 1956 in Koln and Freiburg, he passed the begin German state bar examen in 1956 and the arcsecond in 1960. From 1961 he worked for the Land for European Law of the University at Saarbrcken, where he obtained his doctorate in 1966. Degenhardt joined the Social Democratic Assemblage of Deutschland in 1961, but was forced out in 1971 for of his co-occurrence for the German Commie Party.

From the early 1960s onward, in accession to practicing law, Degenhardt was plus playacting and purgative recordings. He is perhaps uttermost luminary for his birdcall (and the album of the very name) Drama nicht mit den Schmuddelkindern ("don't Playacting With the Grubby Children," 1965), but has released finale to 50 albums, originate with Zwischen Zilch Uhr Nil und Mitternacht ("between 00:00 and Midnight," 1963), renamed Rumpelstilzchen ("rumpelstiltskin"); his utmost recent albums Krieg gegen den Krieg ("war against the War") and Dmmerung ("twilight") came out in 2003 and 2006. In 1968 Degenhardt was convoluted in trials of members of the German educatee movement, occasionally defending social democrats and communists. At the aforementioned time, he was -- in his capability as a singer-songwriter -- one of the majors voices of the 1968 pupil movement. On his 1977 album Wildledermantelmann he criticized multitudinous of his preceding comrades from this era for what he saw as their treachery of socialist ideals and soften towards a social-liberal orientation. The album's backing (roughly, "man with velours coat") mocks the mode of wear they had supposedly adopted.

Notably, the songs on Degenhardt's 1986 album Junge Paare Auf Den Bnken ("young Couples on the Benches"), again with the birdcall Vorsicht Gorilla ("beware of Gorilla") on the 1985 album of the ditto name, are his translations into German of chansons by the French singer-songwriter Georges Brassens, spiritually perhaps one of his closest melodic allies.

Degenhardt has furthermore written innumerable novels, undiminished in a rather autobiographical vein, midway others: "zndschnre" ("slow Matches", 1972), "brandstellen" ("scenes of Fires", 1974), "der Liedermacher" (1982) and "fr ewig und drei Tage" ("for Ever and Ternary Days", 1999).

He was a cousin-german of the Catholic Archbishop of Paderborn, Johannes Joachim Degenhardt, who died in 2002. He is besides the brother-in-law of the American-born illustrator Gertrude Degenhardt, who has made plentiful of his album covers for him. Degenhardt today lives in Quickborn, Kreis Pinneberg.