| From Sweden’s smallest community to the world’s great stages Malte Knapp is born and raised in Sweden’s smallest community Bjurholm. Malte is today one of Sweden’s most known circus performers with his unicycle act. Already at an early age did his interest for circus start to grow since he had a circus area located just nearby his home. Malte was there in the early mornings to help building the circus tent so that he could get free tickets to the show in the evening. When the circus left the town Malte started to play circus with his friends at the backyard. He put up a rope between two trees and started to walk on the tightrope, he also made juggling clubs out of ketchup bottles. In the end of the 70’s Malte Knapp watched a TV broadcast of Franscois Bronett’s circus performance from Djurgårdens circus in Stockholm. This inspired him even more to one day become a circus artist himself. After a few years Malte Knapp managed to convince his mother to buy him a unicycle and he immediately built bike tracks in the backyard where he could practice. I didn’t took long until his first participation in a real circus arrived with the Summer Days in Bjurholm and this is to be concerned as Malte Knapp’s introduction to his professional circus career. In 1988 Malte Knapp was contracted to one of Sweden’s smallest circuses and when the summer break came Malte went on his first tour. The work at the circus didn’t turn out as expected. Malte had to work hard form early evening to late night. After about a month, two of Malte’s new found circus friends went into trouble with the circus manager and ran away. With them gone Malte had even more work to handle so a couple of days later he also decided to leave. He took all his bikes and hid them away in a ditch so he later on could hitch a lift with a news paper buss from Blekinge to Gothenburg. He hooked up with his two friends and they decided to put together a street performance and they started to perform on the famous Avenue of Gothenburg. |
The fall came along and Malte returned to Bjurholm to finish up the last year in compulsory school. In December 1988 Malte made his first TV-performance in the Swedish Christmas show “Liv I Luckan”. In the summer of 1989 Malte Knapp participated in a talent hunt in Bjurholm which he won. This resulted into a participation in the final of Norrland and later on into a performance at the national final held at Chinateatern in Stockholm. Malte Knapp came at the second place after the famous Swedish singer Peter Jöback. This was a great achievement for Malte and he was rewarded with a chance to perform at the popular TV-show “Oldsberg för närvarande” which  |