Sounds of summer



I have three uplifting music recs to make this summer.

A couple of weeks ago I went to the cinema for the first time in over a year and it was so worth it. (It was also pretty empty.) We saw Summer of Soul, a wonderfully observed documentary revisiting the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival. Never heard of it? That’s because it was completely overshadowed by Woodstock. TV producer Hal Tulchin’s 40 hours of footage were relegated to a dusty basement for 50 years until Summer of Soul’s director Ahmir Thompson (aka Questlove) decided it was time to edit, update and air them.

Wow. Everything about it is fantastic – the clothes, the music, the performances, not to mention the emotional recollections from people who were there. (more…)