Soundtracks to films set in swinging pre-war Shanghai are almost always jazz-influenced, which makes sense - it was the music of the time. The city supported more than 50 jazz clubs during the 1930s and 40s and the most prestigious was the Paramount Dance Hall, with its lavish decor and special dance floor constructed with cantilevered springs.
Zheng Deren saw it all as a bassist with Jimmy King's, the first all-Chinese jazz band to take up a residency at the Paramount at a time when the scene was dominated by Filipino musicians.
'Going to dance parties was a must for the rich, famous and influential back then,' says Zheng, now 87 years old. 'Every night [the Paramount] was packed with dance hostesses, bosses and professors.'
That freewheeling period ended when the Communist Party seized power in 1949, and Shanghai jazz has since faced many reversals of fortune. But its prospects are looking up, says Zheng, a co-founder of the visiting Hailin Jazz Orchestra.
The 15-piece outfit first came together as an informal group when Zheng and his contemporaries were invited to perform a repertoire of Shanghai jazz classics in Hong Kong in 2007. Their concerts were so successful the Shanghai Oriental Art Centre offered them a regular slot, and Zheng, along with percussionist Bao Zhengzheng and trumpeter Chen Yulin, seized the chance to formalise Hailin as an orchestra.
For Zheng, it was a chance to relive his glory days at the Paramount, when Jimmy King's - founded by a Shanghainese tycoon - played three-hour sets every night of the week, with a repertoire that ranged from big band and swing tunes from Hollywood to Chinese folk songs with jazz arrangements such as Ye Shanghai and Give Me a Kiss.