Editing East Germany (section)

=== Music ===
{{See also|Jazz in Germany}}

[[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-F0321-0204-001, Berlin, Volksbühne, Oktoberklub, Hartmut König.jpg|thumb|''Oktoberklub'' in 1967]]
[[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-W0115-047, Berlin, Frank Schöbel bei Autogrammstunde.jpg|thumb|Pop singer [[Frank Schöbel]] (center) giving autographs in 1980.]]

A special feature of GDR culture is the broad spectrum of German rock bands. The [[Puhdys]] and [[Karat (band)|Karat]] were some of the most popular mainstream bands in East Germany. Like most mainstream acts, they were members of the SED, and appeared in state-run popular youth magazines such as ''Neues Leben'' and ''Magazin''. Other popular rock bands were {{ill|Wir (band)|de|Wir (Band)|lt=Wir}}, [[City (band)|City]], [[Silly (band)|Silly]], and [[Pankow (German band)|Pankow]]. Most of these artists recorded on the state-owned [[AMIGA (label)|AMIGA]] label.

The [[Schlager music|schlager]] genre, which was very popular in the West, also gained a foothold early on in East Germany, and numerous musicians, such as {{ill|Gerd Christian|de}}, {{ill|Uwe Jensen|de|Uwe Jensen (Schlagersänger)}}, and {{ill|Hartmut Schulze-Gerlach|de}} gained national fame. From 1962 to 1976, an international schlager festival was held in [[Rostock]], garnering participants from between 18 and 22 countries each year.<ref>[http://www.wdr4.de/musik/schallplattenbar/ostseelaender100.html Bericht auf wdr4.de vom 22. Juli 2007] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160127174942/http://www.wdr4.de/musik/schallplattenbar/ostseelaender100.html |date=27 January 2016}}, retrieved 30 September 2014.</ref> The city of [[Dresden]] held a similar international festival for schlager musicians from 1971 until shortly before reunification.<ref>Götz Hintze: ''Rocklexikon der DDR''. 2. Auflage. Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2000, {{ISBN|3-89602-303-9}}, Eintrag zum Internationalen Schlagerfestival Dresden</ref> There was a national schlager contest hosted yearly in Magdeburg from 1966 to 1971 as well.<ref>[http://www.aus-der-ddr.de/person/chris_doerk-pid_4000005786.html Informationen zu Chris Doerk] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160428041438/http://www.aus-der-ddr.de/person/chris_doerk-pid_4000005786.html |date=28 April 2016}}, retrieved 23 December 2010.</ref>

Bands and singers from other socialist countries were popular, such as [[Czerwone Gitary]] from Poland known as the {{lang|de|Rote Gitarren}}.<ref name="rote-gitarren">{{Cite web |title=ROTE GITARREN – Die Offizielle Homepage |trans-title=ROTE GITARREN – The official homepage |url=http://www.rote-gitarren.de |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171019152614/http://www.rote-gitarren.de |archive-date=19 October 2017 |access-date=15 December 2017 |website=rote-gitarren.de |language=de}}</ref><ref name="deutsche-mugge">{{Cite web |title=Rote Gitarren |url=http://www.deutsche-mugge.de/portraits/3782-rote-gitarren.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171019152122/http://www.deutsche-mugge.de/portraits/3782-rote-gitarren.html |archive-date=19 October 2017 |access-date=15 December 2017 |website=Deutsche Mugge |language=de}}</ref> Czech [[Karel Gott]], the Golden Voice from Prague, was beloved in both German states.<ref name="ddr-tanzmusik">{{Cite web |title=Karel Gott |url=http://www.ddr-tanzmusik.de/index.php/Karel_Gott |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171019152122/http://www.ddr-tanzmusik.de/index.php/Karel_Gott |archive-date=19 October 2017 |access-date=15 December 2017 |website=DDR-Tanzmusik |language=de}}</ref> Hungarian band [[Omega (band)|Omega]] performed in both German states, and [[Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia|Yugoslavian]] band [[Korni Grupa]] toured East Germany in the 1970s.<ref name="deutsche-mugge2">{{Cite web |title=Omega |url=http://www.deutsche-mugge.de/portraits/2372-omega.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171019153245/http://www.deutsche-mugge.de/portraits/2372-omega.html |archive-date=19 October 2017 |access-date=15 December 2017 |website=Deutsche Mugge |language=de}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Biografija: Muzičar Dado Topić |url=http://www.opusteno.rs/biografije-poznatih-f151/biografija-muzicar-dado-topic-t18595.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170412013943/http://opusteno.rs/biografije-poznatih-f151/biografija-muzicar-dado-topic-t18595.html |archive-date=12 April 2017 |access-date=19 December 2017 |website=Opusteno.rs}}</ref>

West German television and radio could be received in many parts of the East. The Western influence led to the formation of more "underground" groups with a decisively western-oriented sound. A few of these bands – the so-called ''[[Die anderen Bands]]'' ("the other bands") – were {{lang|de|[[Die Skeptiker]]}}, {{ill|Die Art|de}}, and [[Feeling B]]. Additionally, [[hip hop]] culture reached the ears of the East German youth. With videos such as ''[[Beat Street]]'' and ''[[Wild Style]]'', young East Germans were able to develop a hip hop culture of their own.<ref>Brown, Timothy S. "'Keeping it Real' in a Different 'Hood: (African-) Americanization and Hip-hop in Germany." In The Vinyl Ain't Final: Hip Hop and the Globalization of Black Popular Culture, ed. by Dipannita Basu and Sidney J. Lemelle, pp. 137–150. London</ref> East Germans accepted hip hop as more than just a music form. The entire street culture surrounding rap entered the region and became an outlet for oppressed youth.<ref>{{ill|Elflein, Dietmar|de|Dietmar Elflein}}. {{Cite journal |date=October 1998 |title=From Krauts with Attitudes to Turks with Attitudes: Some Aspects of Hip-Hop History in Germany |journal=Popular Music |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |volume=17 |pages=225–265 |issn=0261-1430 |eissn=1474-0095 |number=3}}</ref>

The government of the GDR was invested in both promoting the tradition of German [[classical music]], and in supporting composers to write new works in that tradition. Notable East German composers include [[Hanns Eisler]], [[Paul Dessau]], [[Ernst Hermann Meyer]], [[Rudolf Wagner-Régeny]], and [[Kurt Schwaen]].

The birthplace of [[Johann Sebastian Bach]] (1685–1750), [[Eisenach]], was rendered as a museum about him, featuring more than three hundred instruments, which, in 1980, received some 70,000 visitors. In Leipzig, the Bach archive contains his compositions and correspondence and recordings of his music.<ref name="Davies1977">{{Cite book |last=Davies |first=Cecil William |title=Theatre for the People: The Story of the Volksbühne |date=1977 |publisher=[[Manchester University Press]] |isbn=978-0-7190-0666-1 |page=126}}</ref>

Governmental support of classical music maintained some 168 publicly funded concert, opera, chamber, and radio orchestras, such as [[Gewandhausorchester]] and [[Thomanerchor]] in Leipzig; [[Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden|Sächsische Staatskapelle]] in Dresden; and [[Berliner Sinfonie Orchester]] and [[Staatsoper Unter den Linden]] in Berlin.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Lys |first=Franziska |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Z9JBDwAAQBAJ&dq=east+Germany+support+classical+music+orchestra+fifty&pg=PA131 |title=Virtual Walls?: Political Unification and Cultural Difference in Contemporary Germany |last2=Dreyer |first2=Michael |author-link2=Michael Dreyer |date=2017 |publisher=[[Boydell & Brewer]] |isbn=978-1-57113-980-1 |language=en}}</ref> [[Kurt Masur]] was their prominent conductor.<ref name="spiegel">{{Cite news |date=12 October 2010 |title=Interview With Conductor Kurt Masur: 'The Spirit of 1989 Has Been Exhausted' |url=http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/interview-with-conductor-kurt-masur-the-spirit-of-1989-has-been-exhausted-a-721851.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171019152621/http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/interview-with-conductor-kurt-masur-the-spirit-of-1989-has-been-exhausted-a-721851.html |archive-date=19 October 2017 |access-date=15 December 2017 |work=[[Der Spiegel|Spiegel Online]]}}</ref>

==== Censorship in the music sector ====
All productions were subject to [[Censorship in East Germany|censorship]]. Texts had to be submitted and shows approved in advance; performances were watched. No one was exempt from this, not even famous artists with connections to the highest circles of the SED government. Under this pressure, strategies were developed to bring critical texts to the audience despite censorship. For example, Heinz Quermann always deliberately built an extreme gag into his entertainment programme so that the censors would have something to cut and the other gags would be less critically scrutinised. [[Tamara Danz]] of the band Silly founded the term "green elephant" (''grüner Elefant'') for such passages.

At the beginning of the 1960s, the music of the [[The Beatles|Beatles]] influenced GDR youth. Initially, this music was still tolerated and supported by the GDR leadership, especially with the help of the FDJ. The high point of this era was 1965, when GDR bands not only got radio and television appearances, but were even allowed to make recordings. However, the SED realised that it could not control and steer this movement, which was basically rebellious and oriented towards the West. In response, most [[Beat music|beat]] bands were therefore simply banned, the others were strictly controlled. For example, Thomas Natschinski's band had to change its English name "Team 4" to the German name "Thomas Natschinski and his group". Other bands were not so conformist. Renft in particular was repeatedly banned from performing and later also the blues rock band Freygang, whose members went into hiding and then played under pseudonyms. This crackdown led to the [[Leipzig Beat Revolt]] in October that year.

Even convinced socialists were banned from performing if their ideas of socialism differed from those of the SED. In 1976, singer-songwriter [[Wolf Biermann]] was allowed to tour in the West; this was immediately taken as an opportunity to denaturalise him and refuse him permission to return. Numerous artists protested against this and were forced to leave the country – some after serving prison sentences – including members of [[Klaus Renft Combo|Renft]], as well as [[Manfred Krug]] and [[Nina Hagen]]. Other artists left voluntarily. [[Veronika Fischer]], for example, did not return from a performance in West Berlin in 1981, whereupon her songs were no longer allowed to be played by GDR radio stations.

West German productions were also subject to censorship in East Germany. For example, the song by [[Udo Jürgens]] "{{Lang|de|Es war einmal ein Luftballon|italic=no}}" ("Once Upon a Time There Was a Balloon") was put on the Index because of the line, "They know no borders, the balloons of the world". It was not until 1987 that Jürgens was again allowed to perform in the GDR. [[Udo Lindenberg]] had similar problems. Despite all his efforts (such as his song "{{Lang|de|Sonderzug nach Pankow|italic=no}}" ("Special Train to Pankow")), he was only allowed to perform once before the fall of the Berlin Wall, at the [[Palace of the Republic, Berlin|Palast der Republik]] on the occasion of the event "{{Lang|de|Rock für den Frieden|italic=no}}" ("Rock for Peace") on 25 October 1983.

In the 1980s, censorship seemed to loosen up. Lyrics about the longing for freedom (including "Albatros" by Karat) became possible. But it was only in the course of the peaceful revolution that songs by Veronika Fischer were heard on the radio again in October 1989.