Topic: Les Blank, RIP

[Stuart]

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/08/movies/les-blank-documentary-filmmaker-dies-at-77.html?hpw

[Rivers]

RIP Mr Blank, one of the true unsung geniuses.

[Bill Roggensack]

Suzie and Eric played a bunch of Cajun tunes for him just a day or two before he passed. Sweet, and very thoughtful.


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[Cleoma]

Playing for Les on Friday was wonderful, Chris Simon called in the morning and said he wanted us to come play some Cajun music and so we just set aside what we were doing and went over that afternoon.  I thought we would just play one or 2 tunes, but he had a bunch of requests and kept asking for more (he didn't have much voice left at all, Chris  could hear by putting her ear right up to his mouth). His eyes were open and he was responding to the music.  We played for about an hour.  Some that he asked for were Grosse Erreur (which was his and Chris' wedding song), Back Door, Amede Twostep.  We also played En Bas de Chene Vert which Les filmed at our house (with DL Menard and Danny Poullard)  for J'ai Ete Au Bal.  And about a dozen other songs.  The sun was shining, Harrod (Les' son) was filming, and it was a very sweet time.  I feel very grateful to have had the opportunity to do something for Les when he's given so much with his films. 

[oddenda]

Shit, we are the oldies now, or should I say revered elders. As such, we are passing on.

pbl

[Lastfirstface]

I truly love Les' films. I didn't discover him through his music docs, but through my interest in Werner Herzog's films. Les Blank's 'The Burden of Dreams', his film about Herzog making Fitzcarroldo, came out on DVD on the Criterion Collection label many years ago and I was impressed enough to seek out the rest of his work, only to find that it overlapped with a lot of my musical interests. I've watched 'Sprout Wings and Fly', 'J'ai Ete au Bal', and some of his other films many times over and feel that he had a great ability to document not only the people who made the music and the music itself, but the whole environment in which that music exists. You can feel the Texas sun beating down on you in that amazing title sequence of 'The Blues According to Lightnin' Hopkins'.

[uncle bud]

CBC's As It Happens did a segment on Les Blank on Tuesday (including a clip from Herzog). The interview is with Blank's son, Harrod.

http://www.cbc.ca/asithappens/features/2013/04/09/documentary-filmmaker-les-blank-1935---2013/ 

Click on the Listen button on that page.