In honor of Carnival (a primarily Catholic celebration held annually in Germany on the Sunday before Lent), concert promotional agency Lippmann + Rau brought over some of the most notable American big jazz bands, including the Preservation Hall Jazz Band from New Orleans and the Grammy Award-winning Woody Herman Orchestra from New York. In a nod to the Americanness of this concert, artist Günther Kieser illustrated a psychedelic superhero dressed like Captain American or Superman. The figure effectively combines American pop culture and counterculture. Rather than sporting the country’s patriotic colors or heraldic motifs like the superheroes, he barrels toward the viewer in neon hues, his form adorned with tattoos like those seen in carnival sideshows. The figure’s glasses are very similar to those made famous by singer-songwriter John Lennon of The Beatles, who had started incorporating round frames into his wardrobe the previous year. Kieser frequently featured such references to unrelated but powerful symbols from the world of music in his posters. Not every band that performed in this concert was from the United States. The Swingin’ Oil Drops was formed in 1966, the year before this poster was printed, by Emil Mangelsdorff (the “EM” in the lower left), a German jazz musician who had appeared with Horst Lippmann in the Frankfurter Hot Club; both of them had been arrested by the Gestapo for their flagrant disregard of Nazi regulations. Mangelsdorff was also a founding member of the Hessischer Rundfunk’s official jazz ensemble, also promoted in a poster in this exhibition.