Around eleven o’clock on Saturday evening it became clear what everyone was already thinking at the Groningen Noorderslag festival: the 2023 Pop Prize goes to Joost Klein, the man who grew up in Stiens and Britsum.
A great festival season, hit success in the German-speaking countries, an exciting mix of festive madness and emotional depth, his upcoming participation in the Eurovision Song Contest: it would have been very strange if Joost had not received the Pop Prize
Joost was already in Groningen a day earlier. Extra security measures were taken during his free performance on the Grote Markt on Friday evening. Not only because of the enormous crowds, but also because there were signals of a threat. That would come from fanatical FC Groningen supporters. “That is one of the stories going around,” says Peter Sikkema, festival manager of Eurosonic Noorderslag.
No pompoms
Possibly for that reason Joost did not show the Frisian flag, normally part of the emotional highlight of his show. That is what the FC camp would have aimed for, as a symbol of football club SC Heerenveen.
Extra fences had been placed, as many security guards as possible from across the city were deployed and the police had deployed ‘quiet’, also to pick out malicious supporters.