The Goethe Institute explains the first jazz style ensemble, called the Fisk Jubilee Singers, reached Germany from the U.S. in 1877 and sparked an immediate interest in American culture and jazz. The popularity of black culture grew in Germany throughout the first decade of the 20th century, only to be interrupted by the outbreak of World War I.
With peace restored in 1918, the Goethe Institute reports the return of the more explicit side of jazz in Berlin of the 1920s with performers such as Josephine Baker providing risqué shows. American performers became popular in the 1920s with German performers finding it difficult to adapt to the improvised styles of U.S. jazz. The Goethe Institute describes only a few German performers becoming popular in this period, including saxophonist Eric Bochard.
The rise of the national Socialist Party, or Nazis, in Germany of the 1930s saw jazz music become a symbol of rebellion against the fascist policies of the party. Research published by The University of Michigan Press states that jazz was referred to by Nazi propaganda as overtly sexual and created by unrespectable blacks. Young people in Nazi Germany opposed to Nazi rule are reported by the Goethe Institute to have adopted the fashions and music of U.S. jazz as a symbol of individual freedom scorned upon by the ruling fascist party.
The German Way and More website explains the presence of U.S. soldiers in West Germany created a great interest in all kinds of American culture including jazz, which was referred to in the 1990s as the "Coca-Cola" culture by writer Rolf Winter. German musicians played in a growing jazz club and bar scene for U.S. soldiers, despite opposition described by the Goethe Institute as affected by Nazi propaganda of the 1940s.
Two different attitudes regarding jazz music grew in the divided Germany of the post--World War II years, with West Germany embracing the music as a safe alternative to rock 'n roll of the 1950s. The University of Michigan Press explains that by 1960 the West German minister of defense had described jazz music as the official music of the newly formed West German Army, heard regularly on state-sponsored radio. In communist East Germany, a different attitude grew of distrust of the free forms and improvised styles of jazz. According to the Goethe Institute, jazz in East Germany had been accepted in a traditional style by the communist government of East Germany, who sponsored orchestras and employed the majority of jazz musicians in the country.
Following the reunification of East and West Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the Goethe Institute reports a difficult transition of musicians of the former East and West Germany countries. Although Germany has readily accepted U.S. traveling musicians, the Goethe Institute reports that few German jazz musicians are known outside of their own country, where a strong jazz scene remains in the first decade of the 21st century.