Directed by Javier Tolentino • Documentary • 2020 • 80 minutes

The city’s musicians and poets take us on a musical tour of Iran’s capital in a charming film about a music culture rarely heard of in the West.

Erfan is a poet and musician, and he lives with his parents and their lively parrot. Fr...

Directed by Antonino D'Ambrosio • Documentary • 2022 • 87 minutes

Directed by award-winning filmmaker Antonino D'Ambrosio, this is the long overdue documentary about the legendary Roberta Flack. Of course she is well known the world over for “First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” and "Killing Me Soft...

Directed by Robert Clem • Documentary • With J.W. Alexander, Ira Tucker • 2018 • 87 minutes

How They Got Over tells the story of how Black gospel quartet music became a primary source for what we would call rock and roll, and in the process helped to break down racial walls in 1950s America.

Be...

Directed by Celeste Bell, Paul Sng • Documentary • With Ruth Negga, Thurston Moore, Kathleen Hanna • 2021 • 96 minutes

Poly Styrene was the first woman of color in the UK to front a successful rock band. She introduced the world to a new sound of rebellion, using her unconventional voice to sin...

Directed by Kenneth Thomas • Documentary • With John Darnielle, Wayne Coyne, Ty Segall, Matt Groening • 2022 • 108 minutes

Indie rock, psychedelic, folk, krautrock, weirdo Finnish prog rock, Japanese noise, glitchy black metal... Aquarius Records discovered and promoted all of this and more, yea...

Directed by David L. Lewis • Documentary • With Nat Hentoff, Amiri Baraka, Karen Durbin • 2013 • 86 minutes

Nat Hentoff was one of the enduring voices of the last 65 years, a writer who championed jazz as an art form and was present at the creation of ‘alternative’ journalism in America. This un...

Directed by Robert Mugge • Documentary • With Sun Ra and his Arkestra • 1980 • 59 minutes

Robert Mugge filmed jazz great Sun Ra on location in Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C. between 1978 and 1980. The resulting 60-minute film includes multiple public and private performances, poet...

Directed by Sigrid Faltin • Documentary • 2008 • 52 minutes

"La Paloma" was born in the 1860s as a Cuban Habanera, composed by the Basque Sebastian Iradier. His simple love song took off on a flight around the world and became an immediate hit in Mexico. "La Paloma" brought tears to the eyes of ...

Directed by Robert Mugge • Documentary • With Gil Scott-Heron • 1983 • 79 minutes

BLACK WAX is a musical-political entertainment film produced and directed by Robert Mugge. It centers on the late African American poet-singer-songwriter Gil Scott-Heron - the man Melody Maker called "the most dang...

Directed by Robert Mugge • Documentary • With Al Green, Willie Mitchell, Ken Tucker • 1984 • 66 minutes

GOSPEL ACCORDING TO AL GREEN looks at Green's transition from hugely successful soul singer to gospel artist and fundamentalist preacher. Filmed in concert in Washington, D.C., in rehearsal in...

Directed by Thomas Robsahm • Documentary • With Morten Harket, Pål Waaktaar, Magne Furuholmen • 2021 • 108 minutes

Follows the band a-ha on tour, telling the full story of how three young men followed their impossible dream of becoming Norwegian pop stars. When Take On Me reached number 1 on Bil...

Directed by Chris Hunt • Documentary • With Agnetha Fältskog, Benny Andersson, Björn Ulvaeus, Anni-Frid Lyngstad • 2019 • 51 minutes

It's been 50 years since Abba's founders met, 40 since their last concert, and 20 since Mama Mia! became a worldwide phenomena. This multi-Gold Award-winning doc t...

Directed by John Scheinfeld • Documentary • With Micky Dolenz, Terry Gilliam • 2010 • 116 minutes

In this definitive documentary on the Grammy® award winning music legend Harry Nilsson, friends, family and colleagues delve into the acclaimed singer-songwriter's music, creative process and person...

Directed by Robert Mugge • Documentary • With Rubén Blades, Linda Ronstadt, Nat Hentoff • 1985 • 82 minutes

THE RETURN OF RUBEN BLADES follows the singer to Harvard, where he gets his master's degree in international law; to his old neighborhood in Panama; to California for a recording session w...

Directed by Fazila Amiri • Documentary • 2023 • 90 minutes

Amidst the United States and Taliban peace negotiations, Afghanistan’s controversial pop star and activist Aryana Sayeed mentors hopeful contestants on the hit singing TV series Afghan Star, including the only two female singers, Zahra E...

Directed by Roberto de Oliveira, Jom Tob Azulay • Documentary • With Tom Jobim, Elis Regina • 2023 • 101 minutes

Los Angeles, 1974. Tom Jobim, the incarnation of Bossa Nova, and Elis Regina, then Brazil's most popular singer, met to record what would become one of the most iconic albums in the h...

Directed by Rita Baghdadi • Documentary • With Lilas Mayassi, Shery Bechara • 2022 • 80 minutes

SIRENS intimately chronicles the lives and music of Slave to Sirens, a band made up of five young metalheads whose burgeoning fame is set against the backdrop of the Lebanese revolution. Its members w...

Directed by Julie Simone • Documentary • With Presley Barker, Wayne C. Henderson, Kitty Amaral • 2019 • 88 minutes

Sister filmmakers Julie Simone and Vicki Vlasic return to their Appalachian roots to film at the world's oldest Fiddler's Convention. With multiple generations jamming together, Fid...

Directed by Adam Bhala Lough, Ethan Higbee • Documentary • With Lee “Scratch” Perry, Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Paul McCartney, The Clash, Bunny Wailer, Marcus Garvey, Carl Bradshaw, Eve, Benicio Del Toro • 2008 • 95 minutes

THE UPSETTER tells the wild, weed-fueled story of Lee “Scratch” Perry — a ...

Directed by Jørgen Leth, Andreas Koefoed • Documentary • With Jakob Bro, Lee Konitz, Joe Lovano, Bill Frisell • 2022 • 92 minutes

An informed and intimate portrayal of the jazz scene that offers revelatory glimpses for fans of the genre, Music For Black Pigeons strikes a universal chord in its p...

Directed by Patrick Savey • Documentary • With Marcus Miller, Herbie Hancock, George Benson, Miles Davis • 2014 • 97 minutes

Patrick Savey plunges us into Marcus’s world, capturing the New York roots of the legendary bass player, following his path like the pebbles of Tom Thumb, as he meets mast...

Directed by Mark Robinson • Documentary • With Butch Willis, Jeff Krulik, Mark Robinson, Gibby Haynes, Ian MacKaye, Guy Picciotto, Karl Hendricks, Brendan Canty • 2020 • 73 minutes

Butch Willis is a Washington, D.C. rock legend. Born and raised in 1960s suburban Maryland, Byron Henry "Butch" Wil...

Directed by Hanley Banks • Documentary • With Bill Callahan • 2014 • 65 minutes

This strikingly shot concert documentary follows enigmatic Drag City singer-songwriter Bill Callahan on a two-week tour from California to New York. For the past 25 years, under both the Smog moniker and under his ow...

Directed by Daniel Fetherston and Danny Szlauderbach • Documentary • With Bill Goffrier, Brent Giessmann, John Nichols, Ron Klaus, Evan Dando, Freedy Johnston, Grant Hart, Thomas Frank • 2022 • 108 minutes

Ignited by punk’s invasion of the Great Plains, America’s gawkiest and greatest lost rock ...