G20
STATUS- INACTIVE
Spruch "Unknown"
Spruch 1 "Schubert Serenade"   Download original version. Schubert Serenade.        
Spruch 2 "Atlantis" by The Shadows Download original version Atlantis by The Shadows.
Spruch 3 "La Raspa" Download original version "La Raspa" by Mariachi Arriba Juarez.
Spruch 4 Bach's Toccata (Female Voice) Download original version. Bach's Toccata and Fugue.
Spruch  5 Brahms: Waltz opus 39 (Male Voice) Download original version. Brahms: Waltz opus 39 
Spruch  6 "Tango Tarragona" (Male Voice)* This is in fact "(When we are Dancing) I get Ideas" by Louis Armstrong.
Spruch  8 "Tango Tarragona" (Male Voice)*(from Daniel Stadermann)
 Spruch 16 This previously unheard "tune" was donated by Andrew T. 
He intercepted it on 13 SEP 1978 on 5.5MHz at 1900 UTC.
"Red Balloon" by Dave Clark Five. 
Comments by Volker K. regarding the origin of the station:

I've enjoyed your site about number stations quite a lot since a while. When listening to the (now defunct) G20 Station, the impression I have when I hear the announcer of it is possibly being Swiss German or Austrian instead of any (at least known to me) East German dialect.�

The use of "Easy Listening" music for the ID also points there. I have hardly seen a country where "muzak" is more omnipresent than in Switzerland, one could almost say it is a "national art form".�

And the Swiss also have a great, albeit slightly dry (not unlike the British) sense of humour. The big picture makes it seem quite logical. Also, it does make sense, doesn't it? There is no other Swiss station registered anywhere, and certainly Switzerland must have had (and still have) a considerable spy network to guard their precious neutrality in the world political scene.
However, here are some new comments from Peter H. in Sep 07.

Some years ago I commented on the German pronunciation
used by numbers station G2.

Now I've listened to the G20 recordings - for the
first time - and Volker K is wrong: The speaker is not
German, Swiss, or Austrian at all. German is certainly
not the speaker's native language - he does not
pronounce the "ch" sound in "Achtung" and "acht"
correctly! This points to a language such as
Hungarian. And since he pronounces "drei" and "Zeit"
much as Austrians do, he probably came from Hungary,
Austria's neighbour.
Pango Pango says: Maybe Volker  K. is right, maybe Peter H in Vienna, we would say, the speaker "klingt b�hmisch" - "sounds bohemian". we used to say this, if someone with Slavic mother tongue speaks German with this special accent. On the other hand, he says "e" like a Swiss citizen.

This unusual station used various odd pieces of music to identify certain messages. For example: Spruchnummer 1- "Schubert Serenade", Spruchnummer 3- "Brahms Waltz", Spruchnummer 4- "La Raspa", Spruchnummer 5 "Atlantis" by the Shadows, Spruchnummer 7- "We Get Ideas" by Louis Armstrong, Spruchnummer 10- Bach's Toccata in D minor, and Spruchnummer 17- "Red Balloon" by The Dave Clark Five. The first sound clip, , is probably the "sickest" I.S. used by a number station. It seems to tease the opposition, almost saying "We have spies in your country and there is nothing you can do about it! It is followed by a message from a male announcer. The second is "Toccata and Fugue" by Bach followed by a female announcer.

A typical message would have been; "Achtung, Spruchnummer 1, Gruppenzahl 38, Zeit 80800, Achtung Spruch Geht, and this is followed by 38x 5F groups, it ends with "Ende Ende". This translates as " Attention, Message number 1, Group Count 38, Time 80800 (actually date/time), Attention-message comes" .

Additional information from Daniel Stadermann:
On June 12, 1983 at 2103 CET (daylight saving time) at approx. 7,772 MHz I came
across a number station of a type I had never heard before. It seemed unusual to
me that it used a real music tune (not some electronic sounds) as IS and that I
never again received a number station on this frequency nor a similar station on
another frequency. I regarded it as a "one-off" station, as you titled this type
in "Secret Signals".

Now I found that the IS and station type of that transmission is identical with
the WAV-sample "Spruch 6" on your website! Except that I recorded "Spruch Nummer
8". I did not expect it to come from the former GDR due to the very strange
pronunciation of the speaker. I was eager to find out what tune was used for the IS.
On your site you give the tune's name of "Spruch 6" as "Unknown".
So you might be interested that I found the melody to be a piece announced
in the (FM) Radio as "Tango Tarragona"*. I also managed to record the Tango
from (FM) Radio, played more tango-style by an orchestra.
*See above!