Music

Throw Down Your Heart follows American banjo virtuoso Bela Fleck on his journey to Africa to explore the little known African roots of the banjo. This exuberant musical adventure provides a glimpse of the beauty and complexity of Africa - a picture that is very different from what is often shown in the media.

Re-released for 2020. Ever wonder why Jews and Rastafarians both use the Star of David and make references to Zion? This exuberant documentary explores the surprising connections between reggae culture and Judaism.

An acclaimed documentary about the life and music of Townes Van Zandt, perhaps one of the greatest singer/songwriters of all time, who inspired artists from Bob Dylan to Norah Jones.

Carpati: 50 Miles 50 Years focuses on Zev Godinger, a Jewish ice cream man of the Carpathian Mountains, a self-described "proste" (ordinary) Jew who embarks on a symbolic pilgrimage to his hometown.

This video profiles members of Banda Dida, an all-girl drumming and vocal group in Salvador, Brazil.

An unusual look at the current political and economic crisis in Colombia—including a decades-long civil war, a rampant drug trade, kidnapping for ransom, and financial scandal at the highest levels of the government—through the eyes of young Colombians, in particular the country’s finest rap musicians, DJs and breakdancers

Between 1840 and 1870, over 250,000 Americans traveled west by covered wagon on the Oregon Trail. Some claimed land in Oregon; others headed for California gold country. Many went enthusiastically. Others reluctantly left homes, family and friends to face hardship and an uncertain future. Actress Amy Warner vividly presents the experiences and feelings of these pioneers in her one-woman performance based on entries from diaries, letters and memoirs of pioneer women and a young girl who trekked the Oregon Trail.

In this offbeat mockumentary, Thompson Merrimack, Chairman of WorldWide Monitor, hosts a performance of the Surveillance Chamber Music Society in a celebration of Jeremy Bentham, whose architectural design of the Panopticon revolutionized systems of penal surveillance in the eighteenth century.

This poetic docu-drama about the pride and anguish of Haiti features the renowned Haitian singer Toto Bissainthe who recounts in song a fable that recreates Haiti's past and reveals its continuing tragedy.

Features conversations with Oscar and Grammy Award winning composer John Corigliano and Tony and Obie Award winning playwright and librettist William Hoffman, who discuss the challenges they faced in creating their first opera, The Ghosts of Versailles.

This cinéma-vérité documentary, shot in high definition video, follows seven Russian teenagers who came to America to become country music stars.

This documentary profiles three women who are reviving a musical legacy, a birthright, which so many of have lost the simple act of singing.

This documentary surveys the revolutionary new developments in American puppet theater, profiling many of puppetry’s most imaginative contemporary artists.

Offers a behind-the-scenes glimpse into one of the country's top opera schools, Indiana University's School of Music, where young singers prepare for one of the world's riskiest careers.

The 1950 debut of Eugene Ionesco's The Bald Soprano, a "mixture of social satire, Alice in Wonderland-type logic, verbal delirium and surrealist farce," stirred a sensation in Paris. For the fiftieth anniversary of the Theater of the Absurd's founding work, the piece has been adapted by The Center for Contemporary Opera into a delightful comic opera in English.

A profile of the colorful singer who uses the street Spanish of Cuba to sing, swagger and slang her way into the hearts of her audience.

Examines the role of black resistance to apartheid in South Africa through a look at two of the nation's leading cultural activists and popular performers--poet Mzwakhe Mbuli and writer/ performer Gcina Mhlophe.

Examines the role of culture in the struggle for national liberation in South Africa by interspersing performances by the Amandla Cultural Ensemble with footage of the mass singing of resistance songs on the streets of South Africa and interviews with leading cultural workers of the African National Congress.

This prize-winning musical comedy/documentary, blending documentary, musical theater and personal memoir, is about three Native American sisters growing up in Brooklyn during the 1930s and '40s.

This musical biography is a documentary-style recreation of the life of Thomas Moore (1779-1852), Ireland's greatest national lyric poet, whose melodies and poems were revered throughout 19th-century Europe.