If you’ve missed all the media fuss about the movie and the thousands of rave posts on social media, here is the trailer.
Here’s how Searchlight Pictures describes Summer of Soul:
In his acclaimed filmmaker debut, Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson presents a powerful and transporting documentary – part music film, part historical record, based around an epic event that celebrated black history, culture and fashion. The Harlem Cultural Festival was filmed in Mount Morris Park (now Marcus Garvey Park) for six weeks in the summer of 1969, just a hundred miles south of Woodstock. The footage was never seen and largely forgotten – until now. SUMMER OF SOUL illuminates the importance of history for our spiritual wellbeing and testifies to the healing power of music in times of unrest in the past and present. The feature includes unprecedented concert appearances from Stevie Wonder, Nina Simone, Sly & the Family Stone, Gladys Knight & the Pips, Mahalia Jackson, BB King, The 5th Dimension and more.
Felice Leon from The Root reviews the film in “Still Black, Still Proud: Unpacking the Untold Story of Harlem’s ‘Summer of Soul'”.
The Harlem Culture Festival. Have you heard of it before?
Better question: If I were to tell you that about 300,000 black people gathered peacefully in a park in Harlem (for six weekends in 1969) and watched performances by Nina Simone, Sly and the Family Stone and Stevie Wonder before Woodstock, would you believe me
Before the news of Summer of Soul (… or if the revolution couldn’t be televised), a documentary by Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson, I would argue that many would say “no”. Hell, I would probably say no. But then I would shake that moment of naivety and remind myself that black annihilation is ubiquitous in this racist American system. It is no secret that black posts (around the world) are being erased from the history books, an act that ultimately maintains white power and privilege.
The Root also dedicated an episode of Unpack That to the documentary, which helps create an important social context.
Summer of Soul begins with an interview with Musa Jackson, who attended the festival. Next, we hear a voice from Cyril “Bullwhip” Innis Jr., a beloved comrade of mine, a community organizer and member of the Black Panther Party in Harlem as we watch footage of a sea of black faces. The opening music chosen for the film is from a young Stevie Wonder.
I won’t be doing any shows from the movie today as I hope everyone sees it! However, I want to play songs from a wide range of musicians performing, starting with Stevie Wonder.
Those of us old enough still remember when he was “little” Stevie Wonder.
Paul Sexton wrote for UDiscoverMusic: “12 year old genius at work: Stevie Wonder debuts his “fingertips” in June.
… it is not widely known that “Fingertips” was a live version of an instrumental album track on which he only played percussion. Written by Hank Cosby and Clarence Paul, it was recorded for his debut album, The Jazz Soul of Little Stevie, which was released in September 1962. Fingertips studio initiated the disc, but although Stevie played bongos, the featured instrument wasn’t harmonica all. It was the flute of Funk Brothers member “Beans” Bowles.
When the Motown Revue went on tour, “Fingertips” had developed into a showcase for the frenetic harmonica playing of the 12-year-old genius and an exciting finale of his live set. In March 1963, Berry Gordy organized a recording car to record the date in Chicago. Then, at the end of his set, with Mary Wells Waiting for the next artist to take the stage, Stevie turned to the crowd.
“I want you to clap my hands”
“The name of the song is ‘Fingertips’,” he told them. “Now I want you to clap your hands. Come on, come on Yes, stamp your feet, jump up and down and do whatever you want to do. ”The track started with a drum figure played by a young Motown House musician named Marvin Gaye.
Little Stevie was loved in Harlem and performed in the Apollo in 1963.
Next up, Summer of Soul brings us the Chambers Brothers, who hail from Mississippi.
Unlike some acts that refer to themselves as such, the Chambers Brothers were truly brothers. Growing up in a farming family in one of the poorest parts of Mississippi, four siblings George, Joe, Lester and Willie first began singing at Mount Calvary Baptist Church in Lee County. After his discharge from the US Army in 1952, the eldest brother, George, moved to South Los Angeles and was soon supported by the other three. Here the four performed all over Southern California, with George on bass, Willie and Joe on guitar, and Lester on harmonica. They worked in the dark for years before switching to a more gospel / folk sound in 1961.
In 1965 they added a drummer to the group, a white man named Brian Keenan, and moved more towards the rock / soul act. The group gained national attention when they performed at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965 and were soon booked into the psychedelic venues of Electric Circus and both Filmore East and West and The Apollo Theater. They recorded their own version of The Isley Brothers’ hit “Shout” for the Vault label, but it went largely unnoticed.
The band were signed to Columbia Records in 1966, and an early version of “Time Has Come Today” was hastily recorded late that year. Unfortunately it was rejected by the label. Instead, a more orthodox single called “All Strung Out Over You” b / w “Falling In Love” was released on December 19th, which became a regional hit. The success of that first single gave the band the opportunity to re-record “The Time Has Come Today” in 1967. This time it became the theme song of their first album “Time Has Come” and reached number 11 on the Billboard Hot 100 Hot in the fall of 1968. The LP contained an 11-minute, psychedelic version of the song.
In the film, they sing “Uptown,” which most black New Yorkers would appreciate as it is difficult to get a cab there.
I’m going uptown to Harlem
Gonna let my hair fall in Harlem
If a taxi doesn’t take me, I’ll take a train
I’m going underground, I’ll get there anyway
This song was actually written for her by a young Betty Mabry, a hostess at the Cellar Club, who later briefly married Miles Davis and became known as Betty Davis.
This footage of The Chambers Brothers at the performance of “Time Has Come Today” was shot in Germany in 1969 – the same year it was released in Harlem.
Gospel is front and center in the film, represented by artists I’ve featured here in the past like Mahalia Jackson and the Staples Singers. We see the Edwin Hawkins Singers enthusiastically received in Harlem and learn that the Edwin Hawkins Singers, as popular as the Edwin Hawkins Singers became with their hit “Oh Happy Day”, have been heavily criticized by their own Pentecostal elders for their worldly fame.
In 1971 the Edwin Hawkins Singers shot a half-hour television special.
I was particularly pleased that the jazz artists Max Roach and Abby Lincoln could be seen at the festival and in the filming – not only because of their outstanding artistic performance, but also because of their commitment to social change and the fight for black rights here and in Africa. Like Marc Anthony Neal about the book We Are Freedom Now! Suite in 2019 it was “An Early Soundtrack to Black Lives Matter”.
While the opening tracks “Driva-Man” and “Freedom Day” captured the spirit of Roachs and Brown’s original vision, the closing tracks “All Africa” and “Tears for Johannesburg”, written after the Sharpsville massacre of 1960, brought international attention to South African apartheid, capture the growing global vision of African American artists and activists.
The literal heart of Freedom Now! Suite was the song “Triptych: Prayer / Protest / Peace”, in which Lincoln’s singing and now the iconic screeching were prominently represented. The song, originally intended as a ballet, reproduced both the trauma and the possibilities of black life in a time that was predominantly characterized by protest and threats of violence. As Roach reflected in the Boston Globe decades later when the driver Rodney King was beaten, “I have pictures of black men hanging from trees, tarred and feathered, grilled… part of the fabric of this land, and I’m not sure when it will stop. “
It is worth 37 minutes to be heard.
I hope that little taste in music whet your appetite today to see the entire movie. Trust I barely scratched the surface of the cast list: Gladys Knight and the Pips, the Fifth Dimension, Sly and the Family Stone, Ray Barretto, Hugh Masekela, David Ruffin, Nina Simone, and more are in this breathtaking film to see piece of history that was somehow buried for 50 years.
Most important to me is that this film shows the world the soul of Harlem – a Harlem full of concertgoers who don’t resemble the “creepy” blacks who are all too often demonized by those outside the black community.
Join me in the comments to talk more about the movie, the music, and Harlem.
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