Summer of Soul (2021)

This is an incredibly uplifting documentary about a festival that I did not even know happened. In the summer of 1969, also dubbed the Summer of Love because it is the summer when Woodstock happened, another music festival happened too. The Harlem Cultural Festival, a six consecutive weekend musical event that happened in the late summer of 1969 in Harlem, featuring black performers for a largely black audience happened and someone filmed it. That film never saw the light of day until now, but it is remarkable. The performances were remarkable, the quality of the film, 50 years on, is also remarkable. But for me the most remarkable part was the audience, full of people who are well dressed, so happy to be in the audience, and so clearly enjoying the show. The documentary interviews a number of people who performed at the festival, but also they found people who were in the audience. They filmed them watching parts of the festival, and the joy they expereinced re-watching what they had long ago experienced was pretty magical. Please watch this, it is uplifting in every way. It is streaming on Hulu, and showing in theaters if you are all about the sound of this wonderful music.