The American Epic Sessions (2017)

Directed by

Bernard MacMahon

Genre

documentary film

Country

United States

Runtime

2h

Rating

7.0 of 10 from 2 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

An engineer brings a 1925 recording system back to life. Then a group of modern musicians each try to make a record using it for the first time in decades.

nostalgicreverenthistoricalenergeticfocusedhands-oncelebratorymusicalwarm

What happens

The American Epic Sessions is a documentary film in which an engineer restores the fabled long-lost first electrical sound recording system from 1925, and twenty contemporary artists pay tribute to the momentous machine by attempting to record songs on it for the first time in 80 years. The film was directed and co-written by Bernard MacMahon and stars Nas, Alabama Shakes, Elton John, Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, Jack White, Taj Mahal, Ana Gabriel, Pokey LaFarge, Beck, Ashley Monroe, Los Lobos, The Avett Brothers, Bettye LaVette, Rhiannon Giddens, Raphael Saadiq, Edie Brickell, Steve Martin, and others. The film employed a diverse line-up of performers both ethnically and musically to represent the breadth of cultures that were first given a national platform through the invention of this recording machine. It also explored the extent to which the recordings made on it in the 1920s influenced and inspired contemporary music. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

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