As time goes by in Shanghai: video

Shanghai's Peace Old Jazz Band have been performing in China since the 1940s. We follow the band on a challenging trip.


Shanghai's Peace Old Jazz Band has been performing together since 1980, but the group's members have been playing much longer than that. Aged between 65 and 87 years, many of them have been playing jazz since the 1940s and have seen the world around them transform.

From the Japanese occupation and the Cultural Revolution to capitalism on overdrive, the band members have seen the many faces of China and withstood the government's suspicions of jazz. Through ages of political upheaval, they never lost their faith and belief in their music.

Now comes one of their biggest challenges: each year Rotterdam hosts the North Sea Jazz Festival and this year, Peace Old Jazz plans to make the trip. Follow them and director Uli Gaulke as they make the hopeful journey to win the love of the festival's audience.