60 Years of the Jazz Club Hannover

The renowned live music club is celebrating its anniversary with jazz events throughout the city. On May 14, Northern Germany’s largest jazz festival will take place, featuring acts such as Nik West. Additional concerts will be held at the Sprengel Museum and the State Opera. The highlight: an anniversary concert on September 26 at the Orangerie, featuring Haffner, Tolstoy, and Quasthoff.

“If you have to ask what jazz is, you’ll never know,” said American jazz musician Louis Armstrong. But for those who do ask, there may still be hope: the Jazz Club Hannover. Founded in 1966 with the aim of providing the Hanover jazz scene with a place for exchange, it is now one of the most renowned clubs in Europe. Back then, the goal was nothing less than restoring the secret capital of jazz to its former glory. Renowned musicians such as Benny Goodman, Duke Ellington, Count Basie, and Lionel Hampton had already performed in the famous basement on Lindener Berg.

With 130 guests, the room is packed, and the audience is practically sitting on the stage. The interior of the former recreation center is decorated entirely in orange. That’s why many people also know the jazz club as the Orange Club. Between 60 and 80 concerts are held there each year. In 2014, the club became an official partner of UNESCO’s “City of Music” initiative, and in 2018, it received the Federal Music Prize for the second time.

But the members of Jazz Club Hannover e.V. agreed that jazz should be heard not just within the club, but throughout all of Hannover. So, when the club was just one year old, they organized the first open-air festival, “Swinging Hannover.” Since then, around 40,000 visitors have gathered every year on Ascension Day to enjoy jazz music in front of the New City Hall. Only in 2020 was everything different: For the first time in the club’s history, due to the COVID-19 situation, jazz and swing weren’t performed outdoors on Ascension Day, but in living rooms—via livestream.

So to this day, Hannover still has its very own answer to the question: What is jazz? And Louis Armstrong played his part in that: after all, he, too, once performed at the Jazz Club Hannover.

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