Lomax the Songhunter
Art & Culture
•
1h 32m
Directed by Rogier Kappers • Documentary • 2005 • 95 minutes
Alan Lomax (1915-2002) devoted his life to recording the world's folk tunes before they would permanently disappear with the rise of the modern music industry. In LOMAX THE SONGHUNTER filmmaker Rogier Kappers follows the route that Lomax took across America and beyond its borders-traveling to remote villages in Spain and Italy, hearing memories and music from the farmers, shepherds and weavers whose songs Lomax recorded decades earlier.
The film also tells Lomax's story by interviewing friends such as Pete Seeger, using archival recordings of music greats Woody Guthrie and Leadbelly, and gathering footage of the cotton fields, rock quarries and prisons where Alan Lomax captured America's quintessential music.
"Mr. Kappers, in an inspired stroke, travels to places Mr. Lomax visited during a long career of collecting the world's folk music on tape. He finds some of the people Mr. Lomax captured and plays the old recordings for them. Watching their faces light up is beautiful." —The New York Times
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