Playing to the camera : musicians and musical performance in documentary cinema / Thomas F. Cohen.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Cohen, Thomas F.

Series:

Nonfictions

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Documentary films--History and criticism.

Documentary films.

Music--Performance.

Music.

Motion picture music.

Physical Description:

154 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

London ; New York : Wallflower, [2012]

Summary:

Playing to the Camera is the first full-length study devoted to the musical performance documentary. Its scope ranges from rock concert films to experimental video art featuring modernist music. Unlike the "music under" produced for films by unseen musicians, on-screen "live" performances show us the bodies that produce the sounds we hear. Exploring the link between moving images and musical movement as physical gesture, this volume asks why performance is so often derided as mere skill whereas composition is afforded the status of art, a question that opens onto a broader critique of attitudes regarding mental and physical labor in Western culture.--Publisher's website.

Contents:

Introduction : In praise of performance

Cool jazz, hot jazz, and hard bop on a summer's day

Wild guitarists and spastic singers : virtuosic performance on film

Direct cinema, rock's public persona, and the emergence of the rock star

Instrumental technique and facial expression on screen

Free jazz meets independent film : Shirley Clarke's Ornette: Made in America

"I'm looking at them and they're looking at me" : observation and communication in Sex Pistols: Live at the Longhorn

Conclusion : Simple gestures and smooth spaces in Robert Cahen's Boulez-Repons.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 139-149) and index.

ISBN:

9781906660239

1906660239

1906660220

9781906660222

OCLC:

373484154