Synopsis Of The Film 'The Land Where The Blues Began'

Video Review #5

The title of this video is “The Land Where the Blues Began” and it is a documentary that was produced by The Mississippi Authority for Educational Television & Alan Lomax. The sometimes visible narrator is none other than Alan Lomax, a renowned ethnomusicologist and collector, as well as the son of John Lomax. The overarching theme in this documentary centers on exploring the roots of the blues. In the introduction of the documentary Alan Lomax talks about how blues belongs to everyone presently and has even created more recent genres such as jazz and rock n’ roll. In saying this Alan Lomax fears that the origin of blues has been forgotten. Throughout the video we are introduced to blues musicians who were whiteness the phenomena

It is well known that many influential blues musicians and songs originate from the Mississippi Delta. The guitar that he plays strongly resembles the one string instrument from Africa. Lonnie also has a very interesting way of recreating the diddley bow on the wooden post of his home by nailing two ends of a wire very tightly. What I found most interesting about this crafting process is the means by which it was tuned which involved moving a small metal cylinder up and down the post in order to get the pitch that you want. I’d also like to note that the music specifically blues, was an essential if not the most essential thing in their lives. If turning part of your home into an instrument doesn’t convince people that it is you passion, then nothing will. The best thing about Pitchford is that he is making music because he loves it and can express himself. His motivations are based on filling up stadiums or selling

Because of that it was useful in expanding my knowledge of not only blues, but of music in general. I understand that all music originated from earlier forms that were considered primitive, but I didn’t expect early blues to be as primitive as what we saw in the documentary. That being said, the simplicity didn’t take away from the quality of the music in my opinion, because I enjoyed every song and tune that I heard. I would have liked for this video to address why white musicians weren’t more involved in the blues. I think it would have also been useful if this video would’ve gone more in depth with the different styles of blues. Lastly I think this video could’ve been improved if it would’ve shown how blues has directly influenced popular genres we listen to today. I know this video is a few years old which is why it fails to address some of the questions, but overall it was a very informative video and I would recommend it to not only anyone doing research, but also to those who simply want to learn about the