ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the political dynamics underpinning the Soviet containment of the domestic effects of jazz, while also examining the background through which the Communist regime admitted American jazz ambassadors into the Soviet Union during the 1960s and early 1970s. The Soviet authorities sought to improve relations with America at this time, while minimizing the perceived risks to the Soviet people posed by American jazz and the idea of Americanism. Soviet tours by Benny Goodman, Earl Hines and Duke Ellington, as well as the unofficial jazz ambassador Gerry Mulligan, indicate the degree of official acceptance that occurred in parallel with the containment of their own jazz scenes and the Sovietization of the domestic jazz discourse. In this sense, the authorities’ treatment of American jazz musicians provides a useful analytical lens through which to understand jazz’s precarious position in Soviet society during this period.
