Black and white footage of performances, interviews, and conversations at the Newport Folk Festival, from 1963 to 1966. The headliners are Peter, Paul and Mary, Joan Baez, Pete Seeger, and Bob Dylan, who's acoustic and electric. Son House and Mike Bloomfield talk about the blues; John Hurt, Howlin' Wolf, and Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee show its range. The Osborne Brothers perform bluegrass. Donovan, Johnny Cash, Judy Collins, Mimi and Dick Farina, and others less well known also perform. Several talk musical philosophy, and there's a running commentary about the nature and appeal of folk music. The crowd looks clean cut.
Direction
Lerner's invisible camera lets legends simply exist.
Cinematography
Grainy black-and-white that feels like stolen memory.
Editing
Performance and philosophy woven like a living conversation.
Director
Murray Lerner
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Lerner shot 40 hours across four festivals but couldn't secure rights until 2005; the film sat unseen for decades.
The infamous '65 electric set wasn't in the original release—Lerner added it later, reframing the entire documentary as tradition-versus-change epic.
US
