NYC PREMIERE Jazz pianist Fred Hersch has been playing professionally for the better part of four decades. He survived a potentially career-ending revelation in the early 1990s that he was gay and HIV-positive to win international acclaim for his masterful style and unique compositions. Eight years ago, however, Hersch nearly lost his life. This intimate […]
US PREMIERE The Alaev Family, a multigenerational family folk-rock group, has been performing for more than 50 years, blending Eastern European, Jewish and Roma influences in unforgettable performances. After the fall of the Soviet Union, their benevolent dictator, Papa Allo, moved his clan from their native Tajikistan to Israel, where he has continued to exert […]
US PREMIERE Together, Anoosh and Arash are Blade & Beard, a pair of techno DJs known for throwing raves in the desert. But they live in Iran, so their scene is underground, their events are secret and they have to stay one step ahead of their repressive country’s morality police or risk imprisonment. Just as […]
WORLD PREMIERE Grab your backstage pass and take a visceral immersion into the 1990s with one of its seminal grunge punk bands, L7. Pigeonholed as an all-female band despite their every effort, L7’s fierce members struggled against music industry and fan expectations even as they contended with questions of celebrity and success. Assembling a dynamic […]
WORLD PREMIERE Since 1956, Sainte Trinité Music School has brought classical music into the lives of thousands of Haitians. Its director, Father David Cesar, has established music programs throughout the island nation, helping make music education accessible to all. In the wake of 2010’s catastrophic earthquake, the school is destroyed — but Father Cesar, his faculty […]
WORLD PREMIERE – In 1980, Bruce Springsteen released his pivotal double album “The River.” In “The Ties That Bind,” Grammy and Emmy winning director Thom Zimny focuses on the making of the album. In an intimate interview, Springsteen reflects on the tumultuous, extended period of writing and recording. The film transitions between Springsteen telling the […]
US PREMIERE Earlier this year, iconic Britpop band Blur surprised their legion of fans with the release of a new album, The Magic Whip, their first as a foursome in 16 years. Blur: New World Towers goes behind the scenes to reveal how an unexpected break in Hong Kong during their 2013 reunion tour inspired the chart-topping […]
WORLD PREMIERE Peelander-Z isn’t your ordinary band. Once audiences see their outrageous onstage antics – human bowling, anyone? – and distinctive color-coded costumes, they might just start to believe the Japanese art-punk band’s claims of coming from another planet. After fifteen years of playing in NYC and touring around the country, Peelander Red decides to […]
NYC PREMIERE Despite a couple of minor hits, soul singer Syl Johnson retired from the music industry in the 1980s, never quite having achieved the success he longed for. But with the dawn of hip hop came the unexpected, widespread embrace of his 1967 song “Different Strokes” – sampled by artists as diverse as Run-DMC, […]
NYC PREMIERE In their 40-year career, the members of the pioneering sound and video collective known as The Residents have insisted on absolute anonymity, performing in distinctive giant eyeball masks and natty suits, and never revealing their true identities. In Don Hardy’s entertaining, accessible film, longtime collaborators, ardent supporters like The Simpsons’ Matt Groening, magician […]