His father Erwin Matter was married to the Dutch Wilhelmina Matter-de Haan. Mani had a two-year-old sister, Helen. From his mother Hanspeter, Jan was (Dutch for Hans) called. From January was his sister Helen Nani in the mouth. Mani was slightly changed then his scout name. Within the family was only spoke French. His childhood and youth was spent in Bern. He attended primary school Enge, the Progymnasium the capitol city and the Gymnasium Kirchenfeld, where he 1955 baccalaureate exam was. Since he had suffered two convulsive disorders after his mother's death, he was declared unfit for service and was so after high school directly to the University of Bern. He first studied one semester German, but later switched to law. In 1963 he acquired - among other things for an internship at the District Court Interlaken - the Bernese advocate patent. In 1963 he became an assistant at the Constitutional Law Professor Richard Bäumlin, 1965, he received his Doctorate in Hans Huber received the highest rating of "summa cum laude". 1967/68 he spent with his family, his wife Joy and their three children Ueli, Sibyl and Meret Matter one year at the University of Cambridge, where he worked on his habilitation thesis, which he completed except for the footnotes, but never submitted. In 1969 he joined the newly created job as legal adviser of the city of Bern. In 1970 he got deviated from the University of Bern a lecturer of Constitutional and Administrative Law. Mani was heard with his Bernese dialect songs in 1960 for the first time on the radio. Public performances he gave in 1967, initially always together with the Berner "Troubadours". His first solo program he launched only in the autumn of 1971 with a concert in Klein Theater Luzern. 1965 first lyrics were published by him. 1966 he released his first record with studio recordings. we know some of his songs only from later shots of his friends Jacob Stickelberger and Fritz Widmer, of them under the title "Dr Columbus" published, as well as the 1972 third of the planned new program composed "Kriminalgschicht". On Friday evening, November 24, 1972 he collided on the way to a concert in Rapperswil on the highway with a truck and died at the accident site. He was 36 years old. His estate is kept in the Swiss Literary Archives in Bern. Mani Matter was born in Herzogenbuchsee, died in Kilchberg and was buried in the cemetery in Bremgarten Bern.

http://www.manimatter.ch/