TEHRAN — The audience members in Tehran’s Vahdat concert hall rose from their seats, clapping wildly as the frontman Bob Belden, a fun-loving New Yorker with a predilection for loud shirts, rested his soprano saxophone on a nearby stand.
“We love you Bob!” someone shouted in English from the balcony after Mr. Belden, 58, finished his third song of the night. A Grammy Award-winning producer, composer and jazz performer, he smiled broadly. “It is an utter honor to be here in Iran,” Mr. Belden said, drawing even more cheers.
The concert last Friday was the first by an American musician in Iran since the 1979 revolution.
Officials from the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance sat in the front row, nodding their heads to renditions of tunes by Miles Davis, Herbie Hancock and Mr. Belden’s own compositions. The Iranians who filled the 1,200-seat theater clapped and cheered. They recorded video with their mobile phones of Mr. Belden and his four bandmates, who did little to suppress their own enthusiasm, waving, smiling and taking their own pictures of the audience.
The Tehran gig was the end of a short, wild tour through a country that officially considers the United States its enemy, but where people go out of their way to please guests, especially when they are American.
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The concert was being recorded for a live album, Mr. Belden said.
“You have made our dream come true,” he told the audience. “Visiting Iran has been such a human experience.”
A version of this article appears in print on February 24, 2015, on page A6 of the New York edition with the headline: The Rebirth of Cool: American Music Makes a Return to Iran. Order Reprints| Today’s Paper|Subscribe
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