Der Rote Bereich was founded in 1992 in Nurnberg, Germany, by guitar player Frank Mobus and bass-clarinet player Rudi Mahall. It began as a quintet with Marty Cook, an American Jazz trombonist, the bass-player Henning Sieverts and drummer Jim Black from New York. Today the avant-garde jazz group includes Frank Mobus who has lived for five years in USA to study guitar and composition at Berkley College of Music, Boston. Returning to Germany he became involved with jazz, rock and electronic music. He worked with Kenny Wheeler, Ray Anderson and Hal Crook. Apart from his Der Rote Bereich, he also plays with the Azul band.

Rudi Mahall, who plays the clarinet in the group, studied classical clarinet at first and later went into experimenting and improvisation. He also plays for Deoi Enttauschung. Apart from that, he plays with other jazz players. Oliver Steidle, the third member of the group, has studied at Meistersinger Konservatorium Nurnberg. He has produced four CDs of which Der Rote Bereich is one of them apart from Larry Porter, Klima Klima and John Schroder.

The group has performed with success in a large number of international jazz festivals, such as Bell Atlantic Jazz Festival in New York, Jazzfest Berlin, Amsterdam Jazz Festival, and others at Cologne, Istanbul and Switzerland.

Since 2001 the group's concerts took Frank, Rudi and Oliver to Portugal, Holland, Austria, Germany, USA and Switzerland. Sponsored by the Goethe Institut, Frank, Rudi and Oliver have travelled through Africa and now they are touring South Asia. After Dhaka, Der Rote Bereich will go to Kolkata, Colombo, Mumbai and New Delhi.

Due to its individualistic style, the group plays unconventional jazz music. It is different from the normal concepts and surprises the audience with unexpected metric and harmonic changes as well an undertones or ironic reinterpretations. The performance is energetic and beyond the routine jazz. Frank Mobus says about the combination of different musical instruments in Der Rote Bereich: "Improvisations are not about a single musician anymore. That is why solo and accompaniment vary in short intervals. The solo itself has an accompanying function."

Der Rote Bereich translates as "The red area" and refers to the red zone that indicates distortion in recording machines. The group's music brazenly skirts the outrageous. Due to its individualistic style Der Rote Bereich performs unconventional jazz music.

Der Rote Bereich is inspired by pop and rock music as well as jazz. It combines cynicism with humour and has unique flow and movement.