Jazz in Germany
Encyclopedia
An overview of the evolution of Jazz music in Germany reveals that the development of jazz in Germany and its public notice differ from the "motherland" of jazz
, the USA, in several respects.
. In his book Jazz - Eine Musikalische Zeitfrage (Jazz - A Musical Issue) of 1927, Paul Bernhard relates the term Jazz to a specific dance. When dancer Josephine Baker
visited Berlin
in 1925, she found it dazzling. "The city had a jewel-like sparkle," she said, "the vast cafés reminded me of ocean liners powered by the rhythms of their orchestras. There was music everywhere." Eager to look ahead after the crushing defeat of World War I, Weimar Germany embraced the modernism that swept through Europe and was crazy about jazz. In the dancing mania of the post-war period, there were not only modern dances such as the tango and foxtrot, but in 1920 also the Shimmy and in 1922 the Two-step. In 1925 the Charleston
dominated the dance halls. Even when under great criticism Bernhard Sekles
initiated the first academic jazz studies anywhere at the Hoch Conservatory
in Frankfurt in 1928 - the first courses in the United States were started in the mid 1940s. The director of the jazz department was Mátyás Seiber
. The jazz studies were closed by the Nazis in 1933.
In 1917, in the United States
, the first jazz title, "Tiger Rag
," was recorded. By January 1920, it had already been marketed by a German record company. As early as the 1920s, the clarinetist and saxophonist Eric Borchard played his own recordings, which were comparable to those of the American jazz greats. But from 1920 to 1923, due to both economic turmoil and inflation, larger German jazz orchestras that played the new jazz dances were a rarity. Initially, a trio with a pianist, a drummer and a "Stehgeiger" (standing violinist), who also played the saxophone, was most common. Only after 1924 an economic stability was achieved, and an economic basis for larger dance orchestras was possible, like those founded by Bernard Etté, Dajos Béla
, Marek Weber and Stefan Weintraub. It was the predominant element of improvisation that was met with a lack understanding in Germany, where people had always played concrete written notes; Marek Weber, for example, demonstratively left the podium if its nightly band played jazz interludes.
In 1920-23, there was a period of economic turbulence and inflation in Germany, until 1924 when the market stabilized and money was invested in entertainment. Consequently, the mid 1920s brought forth a growth of larger bands who agreed to play jazz music. The two most popular German bands that showed the influence of American jazz were Eric Borchard's small combo, and Stefan Weintraub's Syncopators.
Radio also had a role in jazz. In 1926, the radio began to regularly play jazz music, and as time progressed, by 1930, artists such as Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Paul Godwin's band, Red Nichols and Peter Kreuder became popular with German audiences. The listeners were particularly partial to American black musicians such as Armstrong and Ellington, instead of their own German jazz musicians.
In the 20s, Jazz in Germany was primarily a fad. The "Salonorchester" turned to the new style, because dancers wanted it so. By 1924, the first jazz could be heard on the radio; after 1926, when Paul Whiteman
enjoyed sensational success in Berlin, regular radio programmes were broadcast with jazz played live. His music was also available on record and in sheet music. The Weintraub Syncopators were the first hot jazz band in Germany at their summit beginning around 1928. Musicians from many musical backgrounds, composers of classical music concerts such as Paul Hindemith
, Ernst Krenek
and Kurt Weill
, turned to the new music genre that came from America and incorporated it into their musical language. For the classical composers, the orchestral casts, the timbre, syncope, and blues harmonies of jazz were a synonym for the modern era. This new music genre was recognised not only as a fashion and entertainment music, but as real art. However, as early as in 1927, the composer Karol Rathaus called it somewhat prematurely a Jazzdämmerung (jazz dawn). Theodor W. Adorno
spoke negatively about Jazz, saying it was a part of the art industry.
Jazz was much more than just a creative pastime; in fact, people saw jazz as the "essence of the era's modernism," a strong surge toward greater equality and emancipation, posing as a perfect advocate for a democracy in Germany. With its debonair, carefree interdependence on chorus-line culture of the cabarets of Berlin, some dubbed jazz as the "incarnation of American vitalism." Yet, despite the liberal attitudes of the Weimar democracy, the public and private sentiment toward blacks, including African Americans, was ambivalent; there was a lack of black jazz musicians in Germany. Regardless of their social situation, the deeply engrained and institutionalized racism of German society was not tolerant of blacks. For instance, many nationalistic student fraternities rejected student members who were colored or married to colored females. Furthermore, in 1932, all the conservative musicians and critics were denigrating jazz as a product of "negro" culture, which provided the government the fodder to forbid hiring of colored musicians. Thus, for many African American artists, popularity was a mere facade of a grim reality of being seen as a "racial alien." One critic even went as far as to call jazz a mere "negro noise
," having only one purpose: "to introduce obscenities into society."
Paul Schewers, a music critic, brought forth crude images of lewdly dancing black boys and girls in the service of procreation, implying that the lower forces were always surging through blacks, overtaking the rational light of morality and reason the way the white man grasped it. Undoubtedly, sensuality has an affinity with dance, and it was pervasive in jazz and in the lyrics, but this became a means of judging it as void of morality, and even aesthetics, reduced to being inferior to "high German culture."
In neighbouring European countries the trend continued in the 1930s. Fan magazines were created for jazz and so-called "hot clubs". The Nazi regime pursued and banned the broadcasting of jazz on German radio, partly because of its African roots and because many of the active jazz musicians were of Jewish origin; and partly due to the music's certain themes of individuality and freedom. For the Nazis, jazz was an especially threatening form of expression. An anti-jazz radio broadcast From the Cake Walk to Hot sought a deterrent effect with "particularly insisting musical examples."
Perhaps the source of the critique against Jazz was the modernity it implied; in fact, many of the Jazz critics were those who were against any form of modernity. Those WWI veterans with Fascist pretensions and of the anti-Semitic Freikorps banded with other members in the National Socialist movement in denouncing Jews and blacks. This burgeoning hatred of jazz and its subculture infected the entire Nazi party structure that Hitler and his associates were trying so desperately to erect.
Needless to say, Hitler was not fond of modernism in the arts, which included music; in the Nazi party's program of February 1920, he threatened to enforce future governmental laws against such inclinations in art and literature. Even though he never publicly spoke out against jazz specifically in the Weimar Republic, one can infer that Hitler's sentiments toward jazz must have had strong ties to his perception of racial hierarchy, with jazz, not surprisingly, being at the very bottom.
In the 1930s, jazz began to see its downturn and started to suffer. In the eyes of the social and racial bigots, Jazz's potential for being linked with the down-trodden minorities and pariahs of German society - the blacks and Jews - rendered it suspect. To a great extent, Jazz shared a similar fate with other postwar modernist art such as atonal music. It wasn't until 1931 that many crucial British and American jazz players began to leave the country as they faced increasing xenophobic harassment from colleagues and authorities. Many thought that the death of Jazz was upon them, but little did they anticipate that it would be reborn into vitality and health under a dictatorship.
Up until 1935, Joseph Goebbels, the Reich Minister of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, had hoped to convince and persuade the public via anti-Jazz propaganda, rather than prohibit Jazz. However, jazz was officially banned in 1935 (WFMU Staff). In 1935, the Nazi government did not allow German musicians of Jewish origin to perform any longer. The Weintraub Syncopators - most of whom were Jewish - were forced into exile. They worked abroad during much of the ‘30s, touring throughout Europe, Asia, and the Middle East before settling in Australia in 1937. Even people with a single Jewish grandparent like swing trumpeter Hans Berry were forced to play undercover
or to work abroad (in Belgium, the Netherlands or in Switzerland).
Other dance bands and musicians were not even that fortunate. For example, Mitja Nikisch
, son of the celebrated classical conductor Arthur Nikisch
and himself a respected classical pianist, had created a fine popular dance ensemble in the '20s, the Mitja Nikisch Tanz Orchester, which played in prominent venues. The Nazi regime brought about its demise, leading Nikisch to commit suicide in 1936.
From 1937 onward, American musicians in Europe couldn't cross German borders. Admittedly, in spite of such persecution it was still possible, at least in major cities, to buy jazz records until the beginning of the war; however, the further development of, and the contact with, the American Jazz World were largely interrupted. Officially the "Reichsmusikkammer
" (Reichs Music Chamber) supported dance music that bore some traits of Swing, but listening to foreign stations, which regularly played jazz, was penalised from 1939 on. Even after certain songs and performers were banned in Germany, several radio stations played jazz music by printing a new, German-centric label. For example, the song “Tiger Rag” became “Schwarzer Panther,” or the “black panther.” “Joseph! Joseph!” became “Sie will nicht Blumen und nicht Schokolade,” which translates as “She wants neither flowers nor chocolate” (WFMU Staff).
Some musicians did not want to follow this command. Thus, for example, when Jazz was finally prohibited by the Nazis at the beginning of the war, the clarinettist Ernst Höllerhagenleft Germany for exile in Switzerland.
At that time, only a relatively small number of people in Germany knew how jazz music sounded in America - at that time, swing - and that it was Jazz. With the pressing wartime effort from 1941–1943, the Nazis accidentally fostered the jazz craze by forcing bands from Nazi-occupied nations in Western Europe to perform, bringing hot swing. Eventually, the Nazi party realized that jazz could not be removed entirely from Germany (WFMU Staff). The Nazis even re-developed and newly produced some pieces, giving them new lyrics, in special studios. One example is the song "Black Bottom", which was presented as "Schwarzer Boden". For some Germans, the banned foreign stations with jazz programs were very popular.
The Nazis on the one hand would jam transmissions from the Allies' stations, but on the other hand would also copy them. The band Charlie and His Orchestra
is considered as a negative example, also called Mr. Goebbels Jazz Band. Several of Germany’s most talented swing musicians, such as saxophonist Lutz Templin and vocalist Karl “Charlie” Schwedler, were active in a Jazz band. Here the Nazis replaced the original texts with their own provocative propaganda texts that were pro-Nazi and anti-American/British. For example, the lyrics for “Little Sir Echo” has anti-American/British appeal with lyrics such as “German U-boats are making you sore, You’re always licked, not a victory came through…You’re nice, little fellow, but by now you should know that you can never win this war!” Goebbels’ propaganda was broadcast over pirated short-wave frequencies into America, Britain, and Canada in order to spread fear and weaken the morale of Germany’s enemies (WFMU Staff).
The situation intensified in 1942 with the entry of the United States in the war. For diplomats of foreign embassies and Wehrmacht
members, a couple of jazz clubs continued to remain open in Berlin. In addition, individual, illegitimate venues and private parties still played jazz. In 1943 jazz record production was stopped.
The Swing-Jugend, or Swing Youth, was a movement among mainly youth from 14–20 years old who dressed, danced, and listened to jazz in defiance of the Nazi regime. The Nazi party acted against this movement by detaining several of the young leaders of the Swing Youth and sending them to concentration camps. However, the Swing Youth continued to resist the Nazi party by participating in prohibited swing and jazz activities (Neuhaus). Charlie and His Orchestra was moved in the still bombproof province. Jazz was also incorporated into musical works such as operas and chamber music through “art-jazz,” which utilized jazz-inspired and ragtime-inspired syncopated rhythms and modes. Famous operas such as Krenek’s Jonny spielt auf! and Boris Blacher’s Concertante Music for Orchestra are examples of art-jazz (Dexter).
The Nazi regime passed notorious edicts banning jazz records and muted trumpets calling them degenerate art
or entartete Kunst. “Degenerate Music” was an exhibit sponsored by the Nazi regime which singled out “degeneracy” or the use of atonal music, jazz, discordant-sounding organization of tones and the individual composers and conductors, both of Aryan and non-Aryan descent. The “Degenerative Music” exhibit actually had the opposite effect of what the Nazis had hoped because soldiers became interested in genuine jazz (Potter). The documentary film "Swing Under the Swastika"
looks at Jazz music under the Nazi regime in Germany, and at the cases of the Madlung sisters who were sent to Ravensbruck concentration camp merely for owning jazz records. There are also interviews with jazz drummer and guitarist Coco Schumann
and pianist Martin Roman, who were saved in the camps so they could and had to play for SS officers and during executions in Auschwitz as part of the `Ghetto Swingers'.
Moreover, Jazz was found as an uncommon link between the blacks and Jews. Jews at that time were recognized in jazz, not just as musicians and composers, but also as commercial managers, serving as the middlemen of the music. After the Great War in Germany, Negrophobia coalesced with the preexisting anti-Semitism and flourished, especially since Jews were often depicted as having a racial affinity with blacks, possessing similar objectionable qualities. Jews were prevalent figures in new art forms such as jazz, cabaret, and film. Often, a great number of jazz band leaders were Jews, many from Eastern Europe, like Bela, Weber, Efim Schachmeister, Paul Godwin, and Ben Berlin.
In the 1950s, following the model established in Paris, "Existential" jazz cellars (Existence in the French way of philosophy) emerged in numerous West German cities.
On April 2. 1951 Erwin Lehn
founded the dance orchestra of the South German Radio (SDR) in Stuttgart, which he led until 1992. In a short time it developed from a radio-band to a modern swinging Big Band: Erwin Lehn and his Südfunk (southern radio) dance orchestra. In 1955 Lehn, with Dieter Zimmerle and Wolfram Röhrig, initiated the SDR broadcast Treffpunkt Jazz. There Lehn played with international jazz greats such as Miles Davis
and Chet Baker
. In addition to the band of Kurt Edelhagen
at the Southwestern Radio (SWF), the "Südfunk" dance orchestra became one of the leading Swing-Big-Bands in the Federal Republic of Germany in the following years. In 1953, Edelhagen discovered Caterina Valente
in Baden-Baden as a singer for his big band.
American jazz musicians were heard at the Jazz at Philharmonic concerts, and at events in the major concert halls in western Germany. Primarily, local musicians played in the clubs. In order to raise the level of cultural recognition, concert tours by the German Jazz Federation (a merger of the clubs) were increasingly organised. Until the end of the 1950s, the German jazz scene was strongly fixated on imitating American jazz, and on regaining the period of development it had previously missed. However, from 1954 on, West German jazz slowly departed from the pattern established by this musical role model. The quintet of pianist and composer Jutta Hipp
played a central role in doing so; this group included the saxophonist Emil Mangelsdorff
and Joki Freund, who also wrote instrumental compositions. Although Hipp's music was heavily influenced by American role models, she impressed the American jazz critics with her distinctive and independent performances. The peculiarity of her music was an asymmetrical melody in the improvisations, the beginning and end located in unusual places.
English New Orleans jazzbands were fervently welcomed: particularly Ken Colyer & Sonny Morris.
Whereas in America, the rhythmically-accented and innovative Bebop
enjoyed a heyday until the mid-1950s, this music---unlike the Cool Jazz
that had also boomed in the 1950s---was a genre German musicians were unaccostomed to. They preferred Cool Jazz, because with its emphasis on brass melodies, and its interaction, as well as the tone, it was softer and slower---less explosive.
Authorities in German Democratic Republic (GDR) were highly skeptical of jazz due to its American roots. Karl Heinz Drechsel was dismissed from his job at the GDR broadcasting organization in 1952 because of his fondness for jazz and was prohibited from organizing jazz broadcasts again until 1958. The founder of the jazz group Leipzig, Reginald Rudorf, held well-attended lectures on jazz, which also explained the culture of the United States. But they were stopped with disruptive actions by the state security organization ("Staatssicherheit"). In 1957, the Dresdner Interessengemeinschaft Jazz (community of jazz interests) was prohibited in connection with the trial of the regime against Rudorf, as a suspected spy.
While the GDR dance orchestras still played a few Swing numbers, it was Modern Jazz, which could not be integrated into the dance combos, that was officially criticized. It was later denounced as "snotnosed Jazz" by André Asriel.
In 1956 the clarinettist Rolf Kühn
moved to America, gave a guest performance with Caterina Valente in New York and performed with his quartet at the Newport Jazz Festival
in 1957. From 1958 to 1962 Kühn played (as the first German musician) with the orchestras of Benny Goodman
and as a solo clarinettist with Tommy Dorsey
- as replacement for Buddy DeFranco
- one and a half years later. In 1962 Rolf Kühn returned to West Germany.
was built in 1961, West and East German jazz musicians were separated.
On West German television, the great American musicians were introduced to audiences during prime time. Around 1960, Western music producers' interest in recording musicians such as Wolfgang Lauth waned, as jazz music no longer seemed to be a good sale. In 1964, Horst Lippmann
had noted : "The German record industry neglected all modern German jazz musicians and only occasionally presented records with amateur Dixieland bands in the area. No German record company seems to be prepared for the artistic obligation to publish modern German jazz appropriate as it is the case in the field of symphonic and chamber music." Shortly thereafter, as if this appeal had been heard and had caused a new generation of jazz producers (such as Siegfried Loch, and Hans-Georg Brunner Schwer) to emerge, records by Klaus Doldinger
, Albert Mangelsdorff
, but also by Attila Zoller
or Wolfgang Dauner
came onto the market.
The music critic and producer Joachim-Ernst Berendt
took an eminent position at this time, influencing German Jazz mainly in the 1960s and 1970s. Without him, neither the European Free Jazz, even as individual musicians like Mangelsdorff, Doldinger and others, would have gained the importance that they have for the German jazz today. Berendt was the first and only global player of the jazz critics and producers of the German jazz scene, who introduced jazz from Germany abroad.
The best-known jazz groups in West Germany were the quintets of Albert Mangelsdorff (with Heinz Sauer and Günter Kronberg), Michael Naura (with Wolfgang Schlüter), and the quartet of Klaus Doldinger (with Ingfried Hoffmann.) Innovators were also the Lauth Wolfgang quartet (with Fritz Hartschuh) and the trio of Wolfgang Dauner
(with Eberhard Weber
and Fred Braceful
). Musically there was a deliberate but careful delineation of the American model. With their growing popularity, Doldinger and Mangelsdorff could also perform abroad and publish records. Naura had to retire from active life as a musician because of illness, and later became an editor of the Jazz part of the NDR (Northern German Broadcast). For the GDR, the Manfred Ludwig sextet has to be mentioned,originally for a long time the only band, which turned to the style of modern jazz.
In 1965, the quintet of Gunter Hampel
, a moderate Free Jazz maintainer, with musicians such as Manfred Schoof
, Alexander von Schlippenbach
, Buschi Niebergall
and Pierre Courbois, arrived on the German jazz scene and performed many concerts in the "province". Free jazz, without compromises, could be heard from the Manfred Schoof quintet (Voices) and an octet by Peter Brötzmann
(Machine Gun). Especially in the smaller towns of western Germany, jazz music clubs disappeared with the advent of the Beat. From the mid-1960s on, in the GDR, the trio of Joachim Kühn
(who migrated to the West in 1966), Friedhelm Schönfeld, and Manfred Schulze found their own ways into free jazz.
followed this trend in the direction of rock music in West Germany. At the same time, younger musicians like Herbert Joos, Alfred Harth
and Theo Jörgensmann
garnered public acknowledgment and aroused the attention of the jazz scene with their music. It is noteworthy that the German musicians achieved an acceptance with the local audience on par with American jazz musicians. For example, the Theo Jörgensmann quartet, an avant-garde jazz
group, was even in the Best-of Lists of Popular Music in the Music-Yearbook Rock Session. At the same time the German record labels FMP
, ECM
and ENJA
established in the market. Also acoustic-romantic performances by Joachim Kühn
and other pianists like Rainer Brüninghaus
came into fashion. In Moers and other West German towns, festivals were held that focused on these new developments in jazz.
In the 1970s, scholastic learning of jazz was also achieved in West Germany. The annual summer course at the Akademie Remscheid
(Remscheid Academy) was very popular among young jazz musicians. There is hardly a professional jazz musician, born between 1940 and 1960, who did not attend this course as a student or teacher.
After 1970, the mighty government ministries of East Germany gave up their antagonism towards jazz music, giving the "explanation" that jazz had become an integral part of East German culture and politics. Klaus Lenz and the Modern Soul band found its own way to the Fusion of rock and jazz music. In East Germany in particular, free jazz musicians developed their own gestures and improvised first on apparently East German-specific material in such a way that the idea of an "Eisler Weill Folk-Free jazz" could take hold abroad. The self-assertion was more strongly pronounced in East than in West Germany. Among the better-known artists of this era were Conny Bauer
and Ulrich Gumpert (Zentralquartett), as well as Manfred Hering and Günter "Baby" Sommer
. This music resonated with a very broad young audience, and was very successful. The jazz journalist Bert Noglik noted in retrospect: "In the course of the seventies in the GDR in the evolution of jazz the Free Jazz
(in a broader sense) has crystallized to be the form of the major direction of practice and its majority passes, and exists both in quantitative and qualitative respects. This statement refers to the musicians, the audience and also the organizational structure of the concert and tour management. All of this is even more astonishing when one considers that in the eastern and western neighboring regions, there always flowed a relatively strong mainstream music."
, but also style elements that hinted at more modern styles, and neo-classical jazz. In Cologne, there was a strong initiative for Jazz, founding the initiative "Kölner Jazz Haus" (Cologne Jazz House), from which projects such as the Kölner Saxophon Mafia (Cologne Saxophone Mafia) emerged. In Frankfurt, a whole series of guitarists of international significance emerged, among them Torsten de Winkel
, who should later appear on the world's stages with the likes of Pat Metheny
and Joe Zawinul
. And a new interest awakened for the work of Big Bands. Jazz arrangers such as Peter Herbolzheimer
raised this genre in Germany to an international level. New venues were opened in mid-sized cities. Due to the large number of different jazz styles, such concerts were poorly attended, especially in the larger cities.
In East Germany, the development was more clearly arranged. In the 1980s, there was a greater exchange between jazz musicians from West and East Germany. If the cooperation took place within the borders of the GDR, normally a non-German musician was also invited to give this event an international complexion. Economically jazz musicians in the GDR lived in comparatively secure or prosperous circumstances, because they worked in an environment of subsidized culture, and unlike their western colleagues did not need to follow the directives of the free market economy. In addition to a comparatively wide Dixieland scene in the area and mainstream American-style jazz, free improvisational music developed in a way that Fred Van Hove
(later relativated) spoke misguidedly of the, "Promised Land of Improvised Music".
, a well-known entertainer, knew how to integrate jazz into his own comedic art. Another well-known German jazz musician and entertainer is Götz Alsmann, as well as the successful trumpeter Till Brönner
. A number of other jazz musicians became established through entertainment-jazz in the scene as well. However, these are not the only musicians who work as jazz musicians sometimes under difficult conditions in Germany, and who are responsible for creating such diverse styles of jazz.
In addition, between East and West Germany, an alignment of styles occurred, much to the detriment of the East German jazz culture. Over time, elements of jazz were increasingly integrated with other styles such as hip-hop, later Drum 'n' Bass and others, most prominently by the internationally successful duo Tab Two. These new styles of fusion were assessed as Acid Jazz
or as Nu jazz
. Today jazz elements can be found in a great variety of musical styles, such as German Hip-Hop, House, Drum 'n' Bass, dance music, and many others.
Jazz is in low demand on German television. Jazz clubs and other venues still must face the fact that the number of visitors is often difficult to predict and highly variable. Often, younger audiences stay away. Even for tax reasons (so-called "Ausländersteuer" i.e. foreigner tax), the major international musicians, in particular the modern creative musicians, who play in Switzerland, Austria, the Netherlands, Italy and France, increasingly skip Germany on their routes and tours.
Although there are many more jazz musicians in Germany now than in the 1960s and 1970s, it is much easier for the public to form their own individual opinion of the jazz musicians and their music because of electronic media
. Traditional opinion makers
like public broadcasters' jazz editors are losing influence.
It is uncertain in which direction German Jazz will move in the future. The situation of Germany's most renowned jazz festival (JazzFest Berlin) is perhaps symptomatic for this: since the 1990s it has been regularly criticised, and its artistic directors fell back on highly elaborate concepts without a clear artistic line being visible.
Numerous other Jazz festivals exist in Germany.
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
, the USA, in several respects.
The 20s
One of the first books with the word "jazz" in the title originates from GermanyGermany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. In his book Jazz - Eine Musikalische Zeitfrage (Jazz - A Musical Issue) of 1927, Paul Bernhard relates the term Jazz to a specific dance. When dancer Josephine Baker
Josephine Baker
Josephine Baker was an American dancer, singer, and actress who found fame in her adopted homeland of France. She was given such nicknames as the "Bronze Venus", the "Black Pearl", and the "Créole Goddess"....
visited Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
in 1925, she found it dazzling. "The city had a jewel-like sparkle," she said, "the vast cafés reminded me of ocean liners powered by the rhythms of their orchestras. There was music everywhere." Eager to look ahead after the crushing defeat of World War I, Weimar Germany embraced the modernism that swept through Europe and was crazy about jazz. In the dancing mania of the post-war period, there were not only modern dances such as the tango and foxtrot, but in 1920 also the Shimmy and in 1922 the Two-step. In 1925 the Charleston
Charleston (dance)
The Charleston is a dance named for the harbor city of Charleston, South Carolina. The rhythm was popularized in mainstream dance music in the United States by a 1923 tune called "The Charleston" by composer/pianist James P. Johnson which originated in the Broadway show Runnin' Wild and became one...
dominated the dance halls. Even when under great criticism Bernhard Sekles
Bernhard Sekles
Bernhard Sekles was a German composer, conductor, pianist and pedagogue.Bernhard Sekles was born in Frankfurt am Main, the son of Maximilian Seckeles and Anna, . The family name Seckeles was changed by Bernhard Sekles to Sekles. From 1894 to 1895 he was the third Kapellmeister at the Stadttheater...
initiated the first academic jazz studies anywhere at the Hoch Conservatory
Hoch Conservatory
Dr. Hoch’s Konservatorium - Musikakademie was founded in Frankfurt am Main on September 22, 1878. Through the generosity of Frankfurter Joseph Hoch, who bequeathed the Conservatory one million German gold marks in his testament, a school for music and the arts was established for all age groups. ...
in Frankfurt in 1928 - the first courses in the United States were started in the mid 1940s. The director of the jazz department was Mátyás Seiber
Mátyás Seiber
Mátyás György Seiber was a Hungarian-born composer who lived and worked in England from 1935 onward.-Career:Seiber was born in Budapest, and studied there with Zoltán Kodály, with whom he toured Hungary collecting folk songs. In 1928, he became director of the jazz department at the Hoch...
. The jazz studies were closed by the Nazis in 1933.
In 1917, in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, the first jazz title, "Tiger Rag
Tiger Rag
"Tiger Rag" is a jazz standard, originally recorded and copyrighted by the Original Dixieland Jass Band in 1917. It is one of the most recorded jazz compositions of all time.-Origins:...
," was recorded. By January 1920, it had already been marketed by a German record company. As early as the 1920s, the clarinetist and saxophonist Eric Borchard played his own recordings, which were comparable to those of the American jazz greats. But from 1920 to 1923, due to both economic turmoil and inflation, larger German jazz orchestras that played the new jazz dances were a rarity. Initially, a trio with a pianist, a drummer and a "Stehgeiger" (standing violinist), who also played the saxophone, was most common. Only after 1924 an economic stability was achieved, and an economic basis for larger dance orchestras was possible, like those founded by Bernard Etté, Dajos Béla
Dajos Béla
Dajos Béla was a Russian fiddle-player and band-leader.-Career:Golzmann was born in Kiev, now part of the Ukraine, of a Russian father and Hungarian mother. He served as a soldier during World War I, after which he studied music in Moscow...
, Marek Weber and Stefan Weintraub. It was the predominant element of improvisation that was met with a lack understanding in Germany, where people had always played concrete written notes; Marek Weber, for example, demonstratively left the podium if its nightly band played jazz interludes.
In 1920-23, there was a period of economic turbulence and inflation in Germany, until 1924 when the market stabilized and money was invested in entertainment. Consequently, the mid 1920s brought forth a growth of larger bands who agreed to play jazz music. The two most popular German bands that showed the influence of American jazz were Eric Borchard's small combo, and Stefan Weintraub's Syncopators.
Radio also had a role in jazz. In 1926, the radio began to regularly play jazz music, and as time progressed, by 1930, artists such as Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Paul Godwin's band, Red Nichols and Peter Kreuder became popular with German audiences. The listeners were particularly partial to American black musicians such as Armstrong and Ellington, instead of their own German jazz musicians.
In the 20s, Jazz in Germany was primarily a fad. The "Salonorchester" turned to the new style, because dancers wanted it so. By 1924, the first jazz could be heard on the radio; after 1926, when Paul Whiteman
Paul Whiteman
Paul Samuel Whiteman was an American bandleader and orchestral director.Leader of the most popular dance bands in the United States during the 1920s, Whiteman's recordings were immensely successful, and press notices often referred to him as the "King of Jazz"...
enjoyed sensational success in Berlin, regular radio programmes were broadcast with jazz played live. His music was also available on record and in sheet music. The Weintraub Syncopators were the first hot jazz band in Germany at their summit beginning around 1928. Musicians from many musical backgrounds, composers of classical music concerts such as Paul Hindemith
Paul Hindemith
Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...
, Ernst Krenek
Ernst Krenek
Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
and Kurt Weill
Kurt Weill
Kurt Julian Weill was a German-Jewish composer, active from the 1920s, and in his later years in the United States. He was a leading composer for the stage who was best known for his fruitful collaborations with Bertolt Brecht...
, turned to the new music genre that came from America and incorporated it into their musical language. For the classical composers, the orchestral casts, the timbre, syncope, and blues harmonies of jazz were a synonym for the modern era. This new music genre was recognised not only as a fashion and entertainment music, but as real art. However, as early as in 1927, the composer Karol Rathaus called it somewhat prematurely a Jazzdämmerung (jazz dawn). Theodor W. Adorno
Theodor W. Adorno
Theodor W. Adorno was a German sociologist, philosopher, and musicologist known for his critical theory of society....
spoke negatively about Jazz, saying it was a part of the art industry.
Years of National Socialism, the 30s and the missing 40s
Negermusik
Negermusik was a pejorative term used by the Nazi's during Third Reich Germany to signify musical styles and performances by African-Americans that were of the Jazz and Swing music genres. They viewed these musical styles in a racist fashion as inferior works belonging to an "inferior race" and...
," having only one purpose: "to introduce obscenities into society."
Paul Schewers, a music critic, brought forth crude images of lewdly dancing black boys and girls in the service of procreation, implying that the lower forces were always surging through blacks, overtaking the rational light of morality and reason the way the white man grasped it. Undoubtedly, sensuality has an affinity with dance, and it was pervasive in jazz and in the lyrics, but this became a means of judging it as void of morality, and even aesthetics, reduced to being inferior to "high German culture."
In neighbouring European countries the trend continued in the 1930s. Fan magazines were created for jazz and so-called "hot clubs". The Nazi regime pursued and banned the broadcasting of jazz on German radio, partly because of its African roots and because many of the active jazz musicians were of Jewish origin; and partly due to the music's certain themes of individuality and freedom. For the Nazis, jazz was an especially threatening form of expression. An anti-jazz radio broadcast From the Cake Walk to Hot sought a deterrent effect with "particularly insisting musical examples."
Perhaps the source of the critique against Jazz was the modernity it implied; in fact, many of the Jazz critics were those who were against any form of modernity. Those WWI veterans with Fascist pretensions and of the anti-Semitic Freikorps banded with other members in the National Socialist movement in denouncing Jews and blacks. This burgeoning hatred of jazz and its subculture infected the entire Nazi party structure that Hitler and his associates were trying so desperately to erect.
Needless to say, Hitler was not fond of modernism in the arts, which included music; in the Nazi party's program of February 1920, he threatened to enforce future governmental laws against such inclinations in art and literature. Even though he never publicly spoke out against jazz specifically in the Weimar Republic, one can infer that Hitler's sentiments toward jazz must have had strong ties to his perception of racial hierarchy, with jazz, not surprisingly, being at the very bottom.
In the 1930s, jazz began to see its downturn and started to suffer. In the eyes of the social and racial bigots, Jazz's potential for being linked with the down-trodden minorities and pariahs of German society - the blacks and Jews - rendered it suspect. To a great extent, Jazz shared a similar fate with other postwar modernist art such as atonal music. It wasn't until 1931 that many crucial British and American jazz players began to leave the country as they faced increasing xenophobic harassment from colleagues and authorities. Many thought that the death of Jazz was upon them, but little did they anticipate that it would be reborn into vitality and health under a dictatorship.
Up until 1935, Joseph Goebbels, the Reich Minister of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, had hoped to convince and persuade the public via anti-Jazz propaganda, rather than prohibit Jazz. However, jazz was officially banned in 1935 (WFMU Staff). In 1935, the Nazi government did not allow German musicians of Jewish origin to perform any longer. The Weintraub Syncopators - most of whom were Jewish - were forced into exile. They worked abroad during much of the ‘30s, touring throughout Europe, Asia, and the Middle East before settling in Australia in 1937. Even people with a single Jewish grandparent like swing trumpeter Hans Berry were forced to play undercover
Undercover
Being undercover is disguising one's own identity or using an assumed identity for the purposes of gaining the trust of an individual or organization to learn secret information or to gain the trust of targeted individuals in order to gain information or evidence...
or to work abroad (in Belgium, the Netherlands or in Switzerland).
Other dance bands and musicians were not even that fortunate. For example, Mitja Nikisch
Mitja Nikisch
Mitja Nikisch, a classical pianist and dance band leader, was born in Leipzig, Germany on May 21, 1899 and died in Venice, Italy on August 5, 1936.- Life :...
, son of the celebrated classical conductor Arthur Nikisch
Arthur Nikisch
Arthur Nikisch ; 12 October 185523 January 1922) was a Hungarian conductor who performed internationally, holding posts in Boston, London and - most importantly - Berlin. He was considered an outstanding interpreter of the music of Bruckner, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven and Liszt...
and himself a respected classical pianist, had created a fine popular dance ensemble in the '20s, the Mitja Nikisch Tanz Orchester, which played in prominent venues. The Nazi regime brought about its demise, leading Nikisch to commit suicide in 1936.
From 1937 onward, American musicians in Europe couldn't cross German borders. Admittedly, in spite of such persecution it was still possible, at least in major cities, to buy jazz records until the beginning of the war; however, the further development of, and the contact with, the American Jazz World were largely interrupted. Officially the "Reichsmusikkammer
Reichsmusikkammer
The Reichsmusikkammer was a Nazi institution. It promoted "good German music" which was composed by Aryans and seen as consistent with Nazi ideals, while suppressing other, "degenerate" music, which included atonal music, jazz, and music by Jewish composers...
" (Reichs Music Chamber) supported dance music that bore some traits of Swing, but listening to foreign stations, which regularly played jazz, was penalised from 1939 on. Even after certain songs and performers were banned in Germany, several radio stations played jazz music by printing a new, German-centric label. For example, the song “Tiger Rag” became “Schwarzer Panther,” or the “black panther.” “Joseph! Joseph!” became “Sie will nicht Blumen und nicht Schokolade,” which translates as “She wants neither flowers nor chocolate” (WFMU Staff).
Some musicians did not want to follow this command. Thus, for example, when Jazz was finally prohibited by the Nazis at the beginning of the war, the clarinettist Ernst Höllerhagenleft Germany for exile in Switzerland.
At that time, only a relatively small number of people in Germany knew how jazz music sounded in America - at that time, swing - and that it was Jazz. With the pressing wartime effort from 1941–1943, the Nazis accidentally fostered the jazz craze by forcing bands from Nazi-occupied nations in Western Europe to perform, bringing hot swing. Eventually, the Nazi party realized that jazz could not be removed entirely from Germany (WFMU Staff). The Nazis even re-developed and newly produced some pieces, giving them new lyrics, in special studios. One example is the song "Black Bottom", which was presented as "Schwarzer Boden". For some Germans, the banned foreign stations with jazz programs were very popular.
The Nazis on the one hand would jam transmissions from the Allies' stations, but on the other hand would also copy them. The band Charlie and His Orchestra
Charlie and his Orchestra
Charlie and his Orchestra were a Nazi-sponsored German propaganda swing band...
is considered as a negative example, also called Mr. Goebbels Jazz Band. Several of Germany’s most talented swing musicians, such as saxophonist Lutz Templin and vocalist Karl “Charlie” Schwedler, were active in a Jazz band. Here the Nazis replaced the original texts with their own provocative propaganda texts that were pro-Nazi and anti-American/British. For example, the lyrics for “Little Sir Echo” has anti-American/British appeal with lyrics such as “German U-boats are making you sore, You’re always licked, not a victory came through…You’re nice, little fellow, but by now you should know that you can never win this war!” Goebbels’ propaganda was broadcast over pirated short-wave frequencies into America, Britain, and Canada in order to spread fear and weaken the morale of Germany’s enemies (WFMU Staff).
The situation intensified in 1942 with the entry of the United States in the war. For diplomats of foreign embassies and Wehrmacht
Wehrmacht
The Wehrmacht – from , to defend and , the might/power) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the Heer , the Kriegsmarine and the Luftwaffe .-Origin and use of the term:...
members, a couple of jazz clubs continued to remain open in Berlin. In addition, individual, illegitimate venues and private parties still played jazz. In 1943 jazz record production was stopped.
The Swing-Jugend, or Swing Youth, was a movement among mainly youth from 14–20 years old who dressed, danced, and listened to jazz in defiance of the Nazi regime. The Nazi party acted against this movement by detaining several of the young leaders of the Swing Youth and sending them to concentration camps. However, the Swing Youth continued to resist the Nazi party by participating in prohibited swing and jazz activities (Neuhaus). Charlie and His Orchestra was moved in the still bombproof province. Jazz was also incorporated into musical works such as operas and chamber music through “art-jazz,” which utilized jazz-inspired and ragtime-inspired syncopated rhythms and modes. Famous operas such as Krenek’s Jonny spielt auf! and Boris Blacher’s Concertante Music for Orchestra are examples of art-jazz (Dexter).
The Nazi regime passed notorious edicts banning jazz records and muted trumpets calling them degenerate art
Degenerate art
Degenerate art is the English translation of the German entartete Kunst, a term adopted by the Nazi regime in Germany to describe virtually all modern art. Such art was banned on the grounds that it was un-German or Jewish Bolshevist in nature, and those identified as degenerate artists were...
or entartete Kunst. “Degenerate Music” was an exhibit sponsored by the Nazi regime which singled out “degeneracy” or the use of atonal music, jazz, discordant-sounding organization of tones and the individual composers and conductors, both of Aryan and non-Aryan descent. The “Degenerative Music” exhibit actually had the opposite effect of what the Nazis had hoped because soldiers became interested in genuine jazz (Potter). The documentary film "Swing Under the Swastika"
looks at Jazz music under the Nazi regime in Germany, and at the cases of the Madlung sisters who were sent to Ravensbruck concentration camp merely for owning jazz records. There are also interviews with jazz drummer and guitarist Coco Schumann
Coco Schumann
Heinz Jakob "Coco" Schumann is a German jazz musician.Schumann became passionate about Swing after having heard it during the Berlin Olympics. He was transported first to Theresienstadt, where he became a member of the Ghetto Swingers. Finally he and Martin Roman were transported to Auschwitz,...
and pianist Martin Roman, who were saved in the camps so they could and had to play for SS officers and during executions in Auschwitz as part of the `Ghetto Swingers'.
Postwar period and the 50s
In the postwar period, and after nearly 20 years of isolation, many music fans as well as musicians themselves were very interested in the movements of jazz they had missed. In fact jazz gave young people the enthusiastic hope for rebuilding the country. In the jazz clubs, jazz lovers played important records even before they could organize concerts. As World War 2 ended, Jazz was imported to Germany via its strong footholds in England and France, and home-grown post-war jazz was able to develop, particularly in the American-occupied zone. Ironically, many German prisoners first heard Jazz in French camps, and then the occupying Allied forces introduced those records and sheet music into the country. Berlin, Bremen and Frankfurt became centers of jazz. Young German musicians could perform before a larger audience in American GI venues.Moreover, Jazz was found as an uncommon link between the blacks and Jews. Jews at that time were recognized in jazz, not just as musicians and composers, but also as commercial managers, serving as the middlemen of the music. After the Great War in Germany, Negrophobia coalesced with the preexisting anti-Semitism and flourished, especially since Jews were often depicted as having a racial affinity with blacks, possessing similar objectionable qualities. Jews were prevalent figures in new art forms such as jazz, cabaret, and film. Often, a great number of jazz band leaders were Jews, many from Eastern Europe, like Bela, Weber, Efim Schachmeister, Paul Godwin, and Ben Berlin.
In the 1950s, following the model established in Paris, "Existential" jazz cellars (Existence in the French way of philosophy) emerged in numerous West German cities.
On April 2. 1951 Erwin Lehn
Erwin Lehn
Erwin Lehn was a German jazz composer, bandleader and musician. He led the "SWR Big Band", originally the "Southern Radio Dance Orchestra", organized in 1951, for the Südwestrundfunk public broadcasting company....
founded the dance orchestra of the South German Radio (SDR) in Stuttgart, which he led until 1992. In a short time it developed from a radio-band to a modern swinging Big Band: Erwin Lehn and his Südfunk (southern radio) dance orchestra. In 1955 Lehn, with Dieter Zimmerle and Wolfram Röhrig, initiated the SDR broadcast Treffpunkt Jazz. There Lehn played with international jazz greats such as Miles Davis
Miles Davis
Miles Dewey Davis III was an American jazz musician, trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. Widely considered one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century, Miles Davis was, with his musical groups, at the forefront of several major developments in jazz music, including bebop, cool jazz,...
and Chet Baker
Chet Baker
Chesney Henry "Chet" Baker, Jr. was an American jazz trumpeter, flugelhornist and singer.Though his music earned him a large following , Baker's popularity was due in part to his "matinee idol-beauty" and "well-publicized drug habit."He died in 1988 in Amsterdam, the...
. In addition to the band of Kurt Edelhagen
Kurt Edelhagen
Kurt Edelhagen, born 5 June 1920 in Herne, died 8 February 1982 in Köln, was a major European big band leader throughout the 1950s.After having studied clarinet and piano in Essen, he set up his multicultural big band, which over the years would include many big names in jazz in Europe, including...
at the Southwestern Radio (SWF), the "Südfunk" dance orchestra became one of the leading Swing-Big-Bands in the Federal Republic of Germany in the following years. In 1953, Edelhagen discovered Caterina Valente
Caterina Valente
Caterina Valente is a singer, dancer, and actress. She was born into an Italian artist family; her father Giuseppe was a well-known accordion player, her mother, Maria Valente, a musical clown...
in Baden-Baden as a singer for his big band.
American jazz musicians were heard at the Jazz at Philharmonic concerts, and at events in the major concert halls in western Germany. Primarily, local musicians played in the clubs. In order to raise the level of cultural recognition, concert tours by the German Jazz Federation (a merger of the clubs) were increasingly organised. Until the end of the 1950s, the German jazz scene was strongly fixated on imitating American jazz, and on regaining the period of development it had previously missed. However, from 1954 on, West German jazz slowly departed from the pattern established by this musical role model. The quintet of pianist and composer Jutta Hipp
Jutta Hipp
Jutta Hipp was a jazz pianist who also had some success as a painter. She mostly worked in bebop and cool jazz....
played a central role in doing so; this group included the saxophonist Emil Mangelsdorff
Emil Mangelsdorff
Emil Mangelsdorff is a jazz musician who plays alto saxophone, soprano saxophone, clarinet and flute.In 1942 and 1943 Mangelsdorff studied clarinet at the Hoch Conservatory in Frankfurt. As a member of the Frankfurt Hot Club his performing of jazz lead him to being imprisoned by the Gestapo...
and Joki Freund, who also wrote instrumental compositions. Although Hipp's music was heavily influenced by American role models, she impressed the American jazz critics with her distinctive and independent performances. The peculiarity of her music was an asymmetrical melody in the improvisations, the beginning and end located in unusual places.
English New Orleans jazzbands were fervently welcomed: particularly Ken Colyer & Sonny Morris.
Whereas in America, the rhythmically-accented and innovative Bebop
Bebop
Bebop differed drastically from the straightforward compositions of the swing era, and was instead characterized by fast tempos, asymmetrical phrasing, intricate melodies, and rhythm sections that expanded on their role as tempo-keepers...
enjoyed a heyday until the mid-1950s, this music---unlike the Cool Jazz
Cool jazz
Cool is a style of modern jazz music that arose following the Second World War. It is characterized by its relaxed tempos and lighter tone, in contrast to the bebop style that preceded it...
that had also boomed in the 1950s---was a genre German musicians were unaccostomed to. They preferred Cool Jazz, because with its emphasis on brass melodies, and its interaction, as well as the tone, it was softer and slower---less explosive.
Authorities in German Democratic Republic (GDR) were highly skeptical of jazz due to its American roots. Karl Heinz Drechsel was dismissed from his job at the GDR broadcasting organization in 1952 because of his fondness for jazz and was prohibited from organizing jazz broadcasts again until 1958. The founder of the jazz group Leipzig, Reginald Rudorf, held well-attended lectures on jazz, which also explained the culture of the United States. But they were stopped with disruptive actions by the state security organization ("Staatssicherheit"). In 1957, the Dresdner Interessengemeinschaft Jazz (community of jazz interests) was prohibited in connection with the trial of the regime against Rudorf, as a suspected spy.
While the GDR dance orchestras still played a few Swing numbers, it was Modern Jazz, which could not be integrated into the dance combos, that was officially criticized. It was later denounced as "snotnosed Jazz" by André Asriel.
In 1956 the clarinettist Rolf Kühn
Rolf Kühn
Rolf Kühn . is a jazz clarinetist and saxophonist.He lived in the United States from 1956–59 and drew favourable reviews, for example a comparison with Benny Goodman by John H. Hammond....
moved to America, gave a guest performance with Caterina Valente in New York and performed with his quartet at the Newport Jazz Festival
Newport Jazz Festival
The Newport Jazz Festival is a music festival held every summer in Newport, Rhode Island, USA. It was established in 1954 by socialite Elaine Lorillard, who, together with husband Louis Lorillard, financed the festival for many years. The couple hired jazz impresario George Wein to organize the...
in 1957. From 1958 to 1962 Kühn played (as the first German musician) with the orchestras of Benny Goodman
Benny Goodman
Benjamin David “Benny” Goodman was an American jazz and swing musician, clarinetist and bandleader; widely known as the "King of Swing".In the mid-1930s, Benny Goodman led one of the most popular musical groups in America...
and as a solo clarinettist with Tommy Dorsey
Tommy Dorsey
Thomas Francis "Tommy" Dorsey, Jr. was an American jazz trombonist, trumpeter, composer, and bandleader of the Big Band era. He was known as "The Sentimental Gentleman of Swing", due to his smooth-toned trombone playing. He was the younger brother of bandleader Jimmy Dorsey...
- as replacement for Buddy DeFranco
Buddy DeFranco
Boniface Ferdinand Leonard "Buddy" DeFranco is an American jazz clarinet player.-Biography:DeFranco began his professional career just as swing music and big bands — many of which were led by clarinetists like Artie Shaw, Benny Goodman and Woody Herman — were fading in popularity...
- one and a half years later. In 1962 Rolf Kühn returned to West Germany.
The 60s
After the Berlin WallBerlin Wall
The Berlin Wall was a barrier constructed by the German Democratic Republic starting on 13 August 1961, that completely cut off West Berlin from surrounding East Germany and from East Berlin...
was built in 1961, West and East German jazz musicians were separated.
On West German television, the great American musicians were introduced to audiences during prime time. Around 1960, Western music producers' interest in recording musicians such as Wolfgang Lauth waned, as jazz music no longer seemed to be a good sale. In 1964, Horst Lippmann
Horst Lippmann
Horst Lippmann was a German jazz musician, concert promoter, writer and television director, best known as promoter of the influential American Folk Blues Festival tours of Europe during and after the 1960s.-Life:The son of a hotelier, Lippmann played drums in the illegal Frankfurter Hot Club in...
had noted : "The German record industry neglected all modern German jazz musicians and only occasionally presented records with amateur Dixieland bands in the area. No German record company seems to be prepared for the artistic obligation to publish modern German jazz appropriate as it is the case in the field of symphonic and chamber music." Shortly thereafter, as if this appeal had been heard and had caused a new generation of jazz producers (such as Siegfried Loch, and Hans-Georg Brunner Schwer) to emerge, records by Klaus Doldinger
Klaus Doldinger
Klaus Doldinger is a German saxophonist, especially well-known for jazz and as a composer of film music. He was the recipient of 1997's Bavarian Film Awards .-Life and work:...
, Albert Mangelsdorff
Albert Mangelsdorff
Albert Mangelsdorff was one of the most accredited and innovative trombonists of modern jazz who became famous for his distinctive technique of playing multiphonics.-Biography:...
, but also by Attila Zoller
Attila Zoller
Attila Cornelius Zoller was a Hungarian born Jazz guitarist. He won Deutscher Filmpreis for Beste Filmmusik in Germany for the film Das Brot der frühen Jahre in 1962.-Biography:...
or Wolfgang Dauner
Wolfgang Dauner
Wolfgang Dauner is a German jazz fusion pianist, composer and keyboardist born in Stuttgart, Germany, probably best known for his work in the United Jazz and Rock Ensemble and with musicians such as Hans Koller, Albert Mangelsdorff, Volker Kriegel or Ack van Rooyen...
came onto the market.
Joachim-Ernst Berendt
Joachim-Ernst Berendt was a German music journalist, book author and producer specialized on Jazz.-Life:...
took an eminent position at this time, influencing German Jazz mainly in the 1960s and 1970s. Without him, neither the European Free Jazz, even as individual musicians like Mangelsdorff, Doldinger and others, would have gained the importance that they have for the German jazz today. Berendt was the first and only global player of the jazz critics and producers of the German jazz scene, who introduced jazz from Germany abroad.
The best-known jazz groups in West Germany were the quintets of Albert Mangelsdorff (with Heinz Sauer and Günter Kronberg), Michael Naura (with Wolfgang Schlüter), and the quartet of Klaus Doldinger (with Ingfried Hoffmann.) Innovators were also the Lauth Wolfgang quartet (with Fritz Hartschuh) and the trio of Wolfgang Dauner
Wolfgang Dauner
Wolfgang Dauner is a German jazz fusion pianist, composer and keyboardist born in Stuttgart, Germany, probably best known for his work in the United Jazz and Rock Ensemble and with musicians such as Hans Koller, Albert Mangelsdorff, Volker Kriegel or Ack van Rooyen...
(with Eberhard Weber
Eberhard Weber
Eberhard Weber is a German double bassist and composer. As a bass player, Weber is known for his highly distinctive tone and phrasing...
and Fred Braceful
Fred Braceful
Fred Arthur Braceful was a jazz drummer.-Biography:Fred Braceful was born in 1938 as the oldest son of Cludie "Fred" Braceful and Ada Crutcher....
). Musically there was a deliberate but careful delineation of the American model. With their growing popularity, Doldinger and Mangelsdorff could also perform abroad and publish records. Naura had to retire from active life as a musician because of illness, and later became an editor of the Jazz part of the NDR (Northern German Broadcast). For the GDR, the Manfred Ludwig sextet has to be mentioned,originally for a long time the only band, which turned to the style of modern jazz.
In 1965, the quintet of Gunter Hampel
Gunter Hampel
Gunter Hampel is a German jazz vibraphonist, clarinettist, saxophonist, flautist, pianist and composer born in Göttingen, Germany, perhaps best-known for his album "The 8th of July 1969" that included fellow musicians Anthony Braxton, Willem Breuker and Jeanne Lee...
, a moderate Free Jazz maintainer, with musicians such as Manfred Schoof
Manfred Schoof
Manfred Schoof is a German jazz trumpet player.He studied music in Kassel and Cologne.He is a founder of European free jazz and collaborated with Albert Mangelsdorff, Peter Brötzmann, Mal Waldron, and Irène Schweizer...
, Alexander von Schlippenbach
Alexander von Schlippenbach
Alexander von Schlippenbach is a German jazz pianist and composer.-Biography:...
, Buschi Niebergall
Buschi Niebergall
Buschi Niebergall was a German free jazz musician. His given name was Hans-Helmut, and late in life, his friends called him Johannes....
and Pierre Courbois, arrived on the German jazz scene and performed many concerts in the "province". Free jazz, without compromises, could be heard from the Manfred Schoof quintet (Voices) and an octet by Peter Brötzmann
Peter Brötzmann
Peter Brötzmann is a German artist and free jazz saxophonist and clarinetist.Brötzmann is among the most important European free jazz musicians. His rough, lyrical timbre is easily recognized on his many recordings.-Early life:...
(Machine Gun). Especially in the smaller towns of western Germany, jazz music clubs disappeared with the advent of the Beat. From the mid-1960s on, in the GDR, the trio of Joachim Kühn
Joachim Kühn
-Biography:Kühn was a musical prodigy and made his debut as a concert pianist, having studied classical piano and composition with Arthur Schmidt-Elsey. Influenced by his elder brother, clarinetist Rolf Kühn, he simultaneously got interested in jazz. In 1961 he became a professional jazz musician....
(who migrated to the West in 1966), Friedhelm Schönfeld, and Manfred Schulze found their own ways into free jazz.
The 70s
The 1970s were marked by the globalization and commercialization of the German jazz world. Jazz was combined with various other music genres. Successful jazz musicians such as Klaus Doldinger, Volker Kriegel and the United Jazz and Rock EnsembleUnited Jazz and Rock Ensemble
350px|right|United Jazz + Rock Ensemble Farewell Tour 2002The United Jazz + Rock Ensemble developed from a group of jazz musicians that was formed for a 1974 to 1975 television show of Süddeutscher Rundfunk...
followed this trend in the direction of rock music in West Germany. At the same time, younger musicians like Herbert Joos, Alfred Harth
Alfred Harth
Alfred 23 Harth is a German multimedia artist, band leader, multi-instrumentalist musician, and composer who mixes genres in a polystylistic manner...
and Theo Jörgensmann
Theo Jörgensmann
Theodor Franz Jörgensmann is a jazz and free-improvising Basset clarinet player and composer. He has been a professional musician since 1975.-Activities:...
garnered public acknowledgment and aroused the attention of the jazz scene with their music. It is noteworthy that the German musicians achieved an acceptance with the local audience on par with American jazz musicians. For example, the Theo Jörgensmann quartet, an avant-garde jazz
Avant-garde jazz
Avant-garde jazz is a style of music and improvisation that combines avant-garde art music and composition with jazz. Avant-jazz often sounds very similar to free jazz, but differs in that, despite its distinct departure from traditional harmony, it has a predetermined structure over which ...
group, was even in the Best-of Lists of Popular Music in the Music-Yearbook Rock Session. At the same time the German record labels FMP
FMP (Free Music Production)
Free Music Production is a German record label founded by Jost Gebers, Peter Brötzmann, Peter Kowald, and Alexander von Schlippenbach in 1969, specializing in free improvisation and free jazz, usually by European, often German musicians....
, ECM
ECM (record label)
ECM is a record label founded in Munich, Germany, in 1969 by Manfred Eicher. While ECM is best known for jazz music, the label has released a wide variety of recordings, and ECM's artists often refuse to acknowledge boundaries between genres...
and ENJA
Enja Records
Enja Records is a German jazz record label based in Munich, Germany. It was founded by jazz enthusiasts Matthias Winckelmann and Horst Weber in 1971....
established in the market. Also acoustic-romantic performances by Joachim Kühn
Joachim Kühn
-Biography:Kühn was a musical prodigy and made his debut as a concert pianist, having studied classical piano and composition with Arthur Schmidt-Elsey. Influenced by his elder brother, clarinetist Rolf Kühn, he simultaneously got interested in jazz. In 1961 he became a professional jazz musician....
and other pianists like Rainer Brüninghaus
Rainer Brüninghaus
Rainer Brüninghaus is a German jazz pianist and composer.Born in Bad Pyrmont, Germany, Brüninghaus began in the jazz rock group Eiliff. In 1973 he joined the band of German jazz guitarist Volker Kriegel. In 1975 with bassist Eberhard Weber and Charlie Mariano he formed the band Colours...
came into fashion. In Moers and other West German towns, festivals were held that focused on these new developments in jazz.
In the 1970s, scholastic learning of jazz was also achieved in West Germany. The annual summer course at the Akademie Remscheid
Remscheid
Remscheid is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is, after Wuppertal and Solingen, the third largest municipality in Bergisches Land, being located on the northern edge of the region, on south side of the Ruhr area....
(Remscheid Academy) was very popular among young jazz musicians. There is hardly a professional jazz musician, born between 1940 and 1960, who did not attend this course as a student or teacher.
After 1970, the mighty government ministries of East Germany gave up their antagonism towards jazz music, giving the "explanation" that jazz had become an integral part of East German culture and politics. Klaus Lenz and the Modern Soul band found its own way to the Fusion of rock and jazz music. In East Germany in particular, free jazz musicians developed their own gestures and improvised first on apparently East German-specific material in such a way that the idea of an "Eisler Weill Folk-Free jazz" could take hold abroad. The self-assertion was more strongly pronounced in East than in West Germany. Among the better-known artists of this era were Conny Bauer
Conny Bauer
Konrad "Conny" Bauer is a free jazz trombonist. He is the brother of the trombonist Hannes Bauer....
and Ulrich Gumpert (Zentralquartett), as well as Manfred Hering and Günter "Baby" Sommer
Günter Sommer
Günter Baby Sommer is a German jazz drummer.He studied music in Dresden. He rose to fame in the GDR. He is part of the European free jazz avantgarde. He was part of the trio with Conny Bauer and Peter Kowald...
. This music resonated with a very broad young audience, and was very successful. The jazz journalist Bert Noglik noted in retrospect: "In the course of the seventies in the GDR in the evolution of jazz the Free Jazz
Free jazz
Free jazz is an approach to jazz music that was first developed in the 1950s and 1960s. Though the music produced by free jazz pioneers varied widely, the common feature was a dissatisfaction with the limitations of bebop, hard bop, and modal jazz, which had developed in the 1940s and 1950s...
(in a broader sense) has crystallized to be the form of the major direction of practice and its majority passes, and exists both in quantitative and qualitative respects. This statement refers to the musicians, the audience and also the organizational structure of the concert and tour management. All of this is even more astonishing when one considers that in the eastern and western neighboring regions, there always flowed a relatively strong mainstream music."
The 80s
In the 1980s, the jazz audience, as well as the jazz scene, split in many different directions in West Germany. There were forms which included traditional repertory, the various currents of free jazz and fusion music, a turning to NeobopNeo-bop jazz
Neo-bop is a style of jazz that emerged in the 1980s as a reaction against free jazz and jazz fusion. In the United States it is associated with Wynton Marsalis and "The Young Lions." The effort earned praise and also criticism. Miles Davis called it "warmed over turkey" and others deemed it to be...
, but also style elements that hinted at more modern styles, and neo-classical jazz. In Cologne, there was a strong initiative for Jazz, founding the initiative "Kölner Jazz Haus" (Cologne Jazz House), from which projects such as the Kölner Saxophon Mafia (Cologne Saxophone Mafia) emerged. In Frankfurt, a whole series of guitarists of international significance emerged, among them Torsten de Winkel
Torsten de Winkel
Torsten de Winkel is a German musician and composer primarily active in the jazz and world music genres...
, who should later appear on the world's stages with the likes of Pat Metheny
Pat Metheny
Patrick Bruce "Pat" Metheny is an American jazz guitarist and composer.One of the most successful and critically acclaimed jazz musicians to come to prominence in the 1970s and '80s, he is the leader of the Pat Metheny Group and is also involved in duets, solo works and other side projects...
and Joe Zawinul
Joe Zawinul
Josef Erich Zawinul was an Austrian-American jazz keyboardist and composer.First coming to prominence with saxophonist Cannonball Adderley, Zawinul went on to play with trumpeter Miles Davis, and to become one of the creators of jazz fusion, an innovative musical genre that combined jazz with...
. And a new interest awakened for the work of Big Bands. Jazz arrangers such as Peter Herbolzheimer
Peter Herbolzheimer
Peter Herbolzheimer was a German jazz trombonist and bandleader.- Biography :Herbolzheimer was born in Bucharest and migrated from communist Romania to West Germany in 1951. In 1953 he moved to the United States of America, where he worked as a guitarist...
raised this genre in Germany to an international level. New venues were opened in mid-sized cities. Due to the large number of different jazz styles, such concerts were poorly attended, especially in the larger cities.
In East Germany, the development was more clearly arranged. In the 1980s, there was a greater exchange between jazz musicians from West and East Germany. If the cooperation took place within the borders of the GDR, normally a non-German musician was also invited to give this event an international complexion. Economically jazz musicians in the GDR lived in comparatively secure or prosperous circumstances, because they worked in an environment of subsidized culture, and unlike their western colleagues did not need to follow the directives of the free market economy. In addition to a comparatively wide Dixieland scene in the area and mainstream American-style jazz, free improvisational music developed in a way that Fred Van Hove
Fred Van Hove
Fred Van Hove is a Belgian jazz musician and a pioneer of European free jazz. He is a pianist, accordionist, church organist, and carillonist, an improviser and a composer...
(later relativated) spoke misguidedly of the, "Promised Land of Improvised Music".
The 1990s to the present
In 1992, the jazz researcher Ekkehard Jost discerned two basic trends of the jazz scene: one, jazz as a repertoire music and two, jazz in stable and dynamic development. The latter survives through musical practice and is based on the origins of jazz. In the 1990s, even more than in the 1980s, the marketing of music styles dominated the music business, and jazz in particular. Helge SchneiderHelge Schneider
Helge Schneider is a German comedian, jazz musician and multi-instrumentalist, author, film and theatre director, and actor....
, a well-known entertainer, knew how to integrate jazz into his own comedic art. Another well-known German jazz musician and entertainer is Götz Alsmann, as well as the successful trumpeter Till Brönner
Till Brönner
Till Brönner is a German jazz musician, trumpet player, singer, composer, arranger and producer. He has a unique jazz approach influenced by bebop and fusion jazz, but also modern pop music, movie soundtracks , country music and even German pop songs...
. A number of other jazz musicians became established through entertainment-jazz in the scene as well. However, these are not the only musicians who work as jazz musicians sometimes under difficult conditions in Germany, and who are responsible for creating such diverse styles of jazz.
In addition, between East and West Germany, an alignment of styles occurred, much to the detriment of the East German jazz culture. Over time, elements of jazz were increasingly integrated with other styles such as hip-hop, later Drum 'n' Bass and others, most prominently by the internationally successful duo Tab Two. These new styles of fusion were assessed as Acid Jazz
Acid jazz
Acid jazz is a musical genre that combines elements of jazz, funk and hip-hop, particularly looped beats. It developed in the UK over the 1980s and 1990s and could be seen as tacking the sound of jazz-funk onto electronic dance: jazz-funk musicians such as Roy Ayers, Donald Byrd and Grant Green are...
or as Nu jazz
Nu jazz
Nu jazz is an umbrella term coined in the late 1990s to refer to music that blends jazz elements with other musical styles, such as funk, soul, electronic dance music, and free improvisation...
. Today jazz elements can be found in a great variety of musical styles, such as German Hip-Hop, House, Drum 'n' Bass, dance music, and many others.
Jazz is in low demand on German television. Jazz clubs and other venues still must face the fact that the number of visitors is often difficult to predict and highly variable. Often, younger audiences stay away. Even for tax reasons (so-called "Ausländersteuer" i.e. foreigner tax), the major international musicians, in particular the modern creative musicians, who play in Switzerland, Austria, the Netherlands, Italy and France, increasingly skip Germany on their routes and tours.
Although there are many more jazz musicians in Germany now than in the 1960s and 1970s, it is much easier for the public to form their own individual opinion of the jazz musicians and their music because of electronic media
Electronic media
Electronic media are media that use electronics or electromechanical energy for the end-user to access the content. This is in contrast to static media , which today are most often created electronically, but don't require electronics to be accessed by the end-user in the printed form...
. Traditional opinion makers
Opinion leadership
Opinion leadership is a concept that arises out of the theory of two-step flow of communication propounded by Paul Lazarsfeld and Elihu Katz. This theory is one of several models that try to explain the diffusion of innovations, ideas, or commercial products....
like public broadcasters' jazz editors are losing influence.
It is uncertain in which direction German Jazz will move in the future. The situation of Germany's most renowned jazz festival (JazzFest Berlin) is perhaps symptomatic for this: since the 1990s it has been regularly criticised, and its artistic directors fell back on highly elaborate concepts without a clear artistic line being visible.
Notable Jazz events (selection)
- JazzFest BerlinJazzFest BerlinJazzFest Berlin is a jazz festival based in Berlin, Germany. Originally called the "Berliner Jazztage" , it was founded in 1964 in West Berlin by the Berliner Festspiele. It is considered one of the world's premier jazz festivals...
- Deutsches Jazzfestival Frankfurt
- Total Music MeetingTotal Music MeetingTotal Music Meeting is a jazz festival in Germany....
- Internationales Dixieland Festival DresdenInternationales Dixieland Festival DresdenInternationales Dixieland Festival Dresden is a jazz festival in Germany....
- Leipziger JazztageLeipziger JazztageLeipziger Jazztage is a jazz festival in Germany....
Numerous other Jazz festivals exist in Germany.
Literature
- Michael H. Kater (1995): Different Drummers: Jazz in the Culture of Nazi Germany. Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0195165531 (cited after German translation: Gewagtes Spiel. Jazz im Nationalsozialismus. Köln : Kiepenheuer & Witsch)
- Mike ZwerinMike ZwerinMike Zwerin was an American cool jazz musician and author. Zwerin as a musician played the trombone and bass trumpet within various jazz ensembles. He was active within the jazz and prog. jazz musical community as a session musician...
(1988): Swing Under the Nazis: Jazz as a Metaphor for Freedom ISBN 978-0815410751
- Dexter, Dave. Jazz Cavalcade: The Inside Story of Jazz. New York: Da Capo Press, 1977.
- Neuhaus, Tom. “No Nazi Party.” History Today 55.11 (2005): 52-57. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Web. 24 Oct. 2009.
- Potter, Pamela. “Music in the Third Reich: The Complex Task of ‘Germanization.’” In The Arts in Nazi Germany: Continuity, Conformity, Change, edited by Jonathan Huener and Francis R. Nicosia, Chapter 4. New York: Berghahn Books, 2006.
- WFMU Staff. “Charlie and His Orchestra.” WFMU’s Beware of the Blog. (accessed October 11, 2009).
German books
- Wolfram Knauer (1986, Pb.): Jazz in Deutschland. Darmstädter Beiträge zur Jazzforschung 5. Hofheim : Wolke Verlag
- Martin Kunzler (2002): Jazzlexikon : Reinbek
- Rainer Bratfisch (Pb., 2005): Freie Töne : die Jazzszene der DDR. Berlin: Ch. Links
- Mathias Brüll (2003): Jazz auf AMIGA - Die Jazz-Schallplatten des AMIGA-Labels von 1947 bis 1990. Zusammenstellung von Mathias Brüll. (RMudHwiW / Pro Business Berlin - ISBN 3-937343-27-X)
- Rainer Dollase, Michael Rüsenberg, Hans J. Stollenwerk (1978): Das Jazzpublikum : zur Sozialpsychologie einer kulturellen Minderheit. Mainz, London, New York, Tokyo : Schott
- E. Dieter Fränzel/Jazz AGe Wuppertal (Pb.) (2006): Sounds like Whoopataal. Wuppertal in der Welt des Jazz. Essen : Klartext
- Frank Getzuhn (2006): Wandeljahre öffentlicher Lerngeschichte zum Jazz in Deutschland von 1950 - 1960 : Lernangebote und Lernen in Zeitschriften und Sachbüchern zum Jazz. Berlin : wvb Wiss. Verl.
- Bernfried Höhne (1991): Jazz in der DDR : eine Retrospektive. Frankfurt am Main : Eisenbletter und Naumann
- Ekkehard Jost (1987): Europas Jazz : 1960 - 1980. Frankfurt a.M. : Fischer paperback
- Horst H. Lange (1996) Jazz in Deutschland : die deutsche Jazz-Chronik bis 1960. Hildesheim ; Zürich ; New York : Olms-Presse (2. run)
- Martin Lücke (2004): Jazz im Totalitarismus : eine komparative Analyse des politisch motivierten Umgangs mit dem Jazz während der Zeit des Nationalsozialismus und des Stalinismus. Münster: Lit
- Rainer Michalke (Hg., 2004): Musik life – Die Spielstätten für Jazz und Aktuelle Musik in Nordrhein-Westfalen. Essen: Klartext Verlag
- Bert Noglik (1978): Jazz im Gespräch. Berlin (DDR) : Verlag Neue Musik, ders. (1992): Swinging DäDäRä. Die Zeit, 8. Mai 1992, S. 60
- Bruno Paulot (1993): Albert Mangelsdorff : Gespräche. Waakirchen: Oreos
- Fritz Rau (2005): 50 Jahre Backstage : Erinnerungen eines Konzertveranstalters. Heidelberg: Palmyra
- Werner Josh Sellhorn (2005): Jazz - DDR - Fakten : Interpreten, Diskographien, Fotos, CD. Berlin Neunplus 1
- Fritz Schmücker (1993): Das Jazzkonzertpublikum : das Profil einer kulturellen Minderheit im Zeitvergleich. Münster ; Hamburg : Lit
- Werner Schwörer (1990): Jazzszene Frankfurt : eine musiksoziologische Untersuchung zur Situation anfangs der achtziger Jahre. Mainz ; London ; New York ; Tokyo : Schott
- Dita von Szadkowski Auf schwarz-weißen Flügeln Focus Verlag 1983 ISBN 388 349 3074
- Robert von Zahn (1999): Jazz in Nordrhein-Westfalen seit 1946. Köln: Emons; ders. (1998): Jazz in Köln seit 1945 : Konzertkultur und Kellerkunst. Köln : Emons-Verlag
Magazines in German about Jazz
- Jazz Echo
- Jazzpodium
- Jazzthetik
- Jazz thing
- Jazz Zeit
- Jazz Zeitung
External links
- Jazz from Germany, online dossier by the Goethe-InstitutGoethe-InstitutThe Goethe-Institut is a non-profit German cultural institution operational worldwide, promoting the study of the German language abroad and encouraging international cultural exchange and relations. The Goethe-Institut also fosters knowledge about Germany by providing information on German...