Gouden Kalf Beste Lange Documentaire 2005

Nominatie Emmy Award 2006

First Appearance IDFA 2004, publiekswaardering 8,3

regie Rogier Kappers, camera Adri Schrover, montage Jos Driessen, producent Joost Verheij - MM Filmprodukties

lange documentaire, 94 minuten, 16mm

Alan Lomax nam in de dertiger jaren volksmuziek op in de zuidelijke Verenigde Staten en ontdekte Leadbelly, Woody Guthrie en Fred McDowell. Vanaf 1950 reisde hij door Europa. Opgebouwd als een roadmovie volgt de documentaire de sporen van Lomax in Schotland, Spanje en Zuid-Italië.

 

User review on PBS website: Priceless *****

What an astounding wealth of understanding, insight, courage, vision and true musical exploration this man, and this outstanding documentary represents.

As a professional musician, conductor, composer, perhaps most notably within this forum of contemporary classical works in Sicilian, a so-called dialect and dead language, I was thrilled to hear and parake of his work in Sicily. Notwithstanding, his work all over America, Spain, etc, moved me deeply as well as I sat spellbound by both the performers and the story that was/is his life. I lived over seas ( Brazil) for 6 years and have worked in Europe, Sicily and Spain and so had much resonance with a great deal of the music that he recorded. His visionary understanding of the "lack" of communication in our world, spearheaded by our cultural dissemination of the most common denominator, inspires us once again to wake up a seek the local and regional and preserve the small and seemingly lack luster, which is truly more genuine and important than many grammy winners and highly marketed packages masquerading as "artists" . Even within the "classical performing world, from singers to instrumentalists to conductors" this is also true. Bravo to POV for presenting this deeply important documentary. To those of you who know musicians do spread the word and insist that they watch. I will be using this documentary with my opera company, as we often train young singers. Bravo, bravo, bravo!!! and thank you Mr. Lomax for all that you have done for us...

by Thomas Lawrence Toscano from Brookyn, NY, July 4, 2010, 3:16 PM

User Review On IMDB:

Lomax the Songhunter is an excellent documentary, 11 September 2006
Author: tavm from Baton Rouge, La.

For years, I've heard about Alan Lomax and his folk recordings for the Library of Congress but it wasn't until I saw this documentary on the PBS series P.O.V. that I even had an inkling of what he did. This film is as good a start as any to learn about this important researcher and his preservation efforts among various folk artists around the world. We go to Italy, Spain, and, Ireland to hear various work songs and we see Lomax himself sing some of his favorites. He is shown in various times in his life up to just before he died in 2002 when he could hardly speak. And Pete Seeger recounts of his own discovery by Lomax. So if you love to hear unique music of various cultures, I suggest you definitely seek this one out.