Born In Chicago-The Movie (2020/2023)
If you think that blues music is always slow and sad, and mostly an extinct art form–this is the film to watch to change your view.
It’s hard to improve on the summary I found in the Internet Movie Database
“Born In Chicago is a soulful documentary film that chronicles a uniquely musical passing of the torch. It’s the story of first generation blues performers who had made their way to Chicago from the Mississippi Delta and their ardent and unexpected followers – young white, middle class kids who followed the evocative music to smoky clubs deep in Chicago’s ghettos. Passed down from musician to musician, the Chicago blues transcended the color lines of the 1960s as young, white Chicago musicians apprenticed themselves to legends such as Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf”-Anonymous
The film features sound and video clips with blues musicians from the era: Muddy Waters, Hubert Sumlin, Buddy Guy, Howlin Wolf, Michael Bloomfield, Paul Butterfield, Charlie Musselwhite, Elvin Bishop, and quite a few more. Others make an appearance via interviews or off camera commentary.
To me, it’s interesting to think about the musical evolution from acoustic blues music played in the South, mostly to black audiences, to the evolution of the music to electric instruments with crossover appeal to college age students. The music then further evolved into the rock and roll that we associate with The Rolling Stones, Cream, and Jefferson Airplane. A quote that I remember reading, attributed to Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones is “Ya got’s to know your blues”.
True.
How to Watch? Here’s what I found. I don’t claim this to be an exhaustive list
- Amazon Prime Video (requires purchase or an Amazon Prime membership)
- Freevee-free with ads
- Tubi-free with ads
- Plex-not familiar with this one
- Youtube (might have to pay for this)
- Appletv (might have to pay for this)
I have ideas for further listening that I wrote down while watching the film. It’s a long list, featuring albums I own (eg Michael Bloomfield “If You Love These Blues-Play Them As You Please), or albums I don’t know from artists that I do know (eg Charlie Musselwhite “Stand Back”) to albums by artists that I’m really not that familiar with (Siegel Schwall Blues Band, Harvey Mandel)
I’ll be busy for a while.