The Big Band of the Deutsche Oper Berlin is celebrating it's 20th anniversary and dedicating itself to French jazz. During the German occupation, it stood for freedom and resistance, and in the post-war period it became the soundtrack of existentialism and an expression of the attitude to life of an entire generation. In the nightclubs of Saint-Germain-des-Prés, musicians such as Miles Davis and Sidney Bechet met Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, and Boris Vian. For many jazz musicians from the USA, Paris became a place of longing beyond racial segregation and the McCarthy era. The Deutsche Oper Berlin Big Band celebrates the spirit of those years with music by Michel Legrand, Jacques Brel, Boris Vian, and Django Reinhardt.