LGM Film Club, Part 64: Sprout Wings and Fly

Criterion Channel is running a program of Les Blank’s documentaries. I have seen quite a few of his groundbreaking and wonderful work in the 70s and 80s documenting American folk culture, mostly around food and music. His documentaries on Lightin’ Hopkins and Cajun food and the Gilroy Garlic Festival are all really worth it. But I did not know that he made a film about Tommy Jarrell, the old-time fiddler and singer who was a sort of post-folk era discovery by Alice Gerard and others who made some great modern recordings of his work. He was healthy and energetic up to the day he died, or close to it. So unlike some of these recordings showing someone with highly diminished ability (say, the late Son House or Skip James recordings), Jarrell really rips through it. I’ve had the 4-CD collection of these recordings for years. Anyway, the film is quite worthy too. Gerard is also in it, but she doesn’t speak. Here’s an excerpt: