Body and Soul: An American Bridge

March 3, 2018 at the Carmel High School Performing Arts Center

6:30 p.m. Reception, 7:30 p.m. Film, Q & A with film director Robert Philipson

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Documentary / United States / 2017

Director: Robert Philipson

Running Time: 58 minutes   

English

 

About The Film

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The Great American Songbook is replete with standards from Jewish composers and inducted into the jazz canon by black musicians. Perhaps none has been as enduring as the 1930s tune “Body and Soul,” composed by Jewish songwriter Johnny Green, introduced on Broadway by Jewish torch singer Libby Holman, and first recorded as a jazz piece by Louis Armstrong. Filmmaker Robert Philipson goes in-depth to examine the song’s timelessness, and its role at the heart of both black and Jewish music. It’s a link both sympathetic and contentious, with both sides borrowing and learning from, and complementing the other. Interviews with experts and historians combine with rare archival footage and brilliant performances to tell the narrative of this ageless classic.

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Winner of the Best Music Documentary award at the San Francisco Black Film Festival, BODY AND SOUL: AN AMERICAN BRIDGE is a tribute to the enduring power of song to break down barriers and unite disparate peoples.