America Works...America Sings

Gerald S. Doyle was one of the first collectors of Newfoundland folk songs. He was also an avid cinematographer who left a collection of 12 hours of colour film, shot in outport Newfoundland and Labrador in the 1930's, 40's, and 50's.

The Shipibo-Konibo people of Peruvian Amazon decorate their pottery, jewelry, textiles, and body art with complex geometric patterns called kené. These patterns also have corresponding songs, called icaros, which are integral to the Shipibo way of life. This documentary explores these unique art forms, and one Shipibo family's efforts to safeguard the tradition.

Two elderly sisters share the delicate art of making traditional Hungarian strudel and reveal a deeply personal family story about their mother, who taught them everything they know.

A single female voice sings of waiting in her garden for her ‘dark-eyed sailor’ to return from war, bearing the other half of their token, a gimmel ring. Three veterans pass on the road as she waits, and she asks them: “When you were fighting in distant lands, did you think of the home you left?” In reply the veterans relate their recollections. The garden images in the accompanying film represent ‘home’, but also stand for a more general possibility of redemption, of the potential of the past to return at any time, disguised and changed, to renew the present: “Each moment of time is a garden gate,” the song goes, “Through it my love may walk.”

The members of the Ayrudzi troupe travel across various villages of Armenia on horseback and put on folk song and dance concerts and shadow theatre performances for the locals.

An intimate look into the lives of one of the most iconic folk-rock bands in America - the Indigo Girls. With never-before-seen archival and intimate vérité the film dives into the songwriting and storytelling of the music that transformed a generation.

AWAKE is a short experimental documentary about a liminal moment in the calendar - midwinter - observed by the inhabitants of a small rural village in England. A time outside time, magic is everywhere and anything is possible. Bearing witness to this turning point, the inhabitants gather for a wassail - a centuries old thanksgiving ritual in which folk gather to honour the slow return of the sun and bless the apple trees whose fruit are essential to the village ecosystem, not least the crumbles, juice and cider that sustains them throughout the year.

“Behind time, time comes” interlaced with folk songs, narrates the rhythms of rural life, where time and its weight, shape and define the landscape, as well as the lives that compose it. Accompanying the reminiscences of a group of women from the parish of Dornelas, Sever do Vouga, Portugal.

The folk duo 'Yeoyu and Seolbin' completed their third album, 「Comedy」, while living in Jeju. The record swept the Folk category at the Korean Music Awards and was praised as "a single album that has it all—regret and sympathy, rage and sorrow, and hope." Exploring what it means to be alive in the face of life's tragedies, the duo weaves a subtle yet powerful narrative through Jeju's landscapes: an old house and its yard, a Chinese restaurant where they once worked, and the recording studio.

Four sexually hungry high school students preparing for their university entrance exams meet up with an inebriated teacher singing bawdy drinking songs. This encounter sets them on a less than academic path.

The love between the only daughter of a chief shepherd and a poor shepherd on the slopes of Mt. Olympus.

A husband and wife recall an event when their love was tested amid Punjabi pre-wedding customs, as their family continued to create a scene due to cultural and racial differences, which persisted despite the customs.

Nepalese folk songs danced and sung by everyone.

The first story is based on an Indian fairy-tale. It is a story about a donkey who wants to win favour with its master and starts to mock the master’s favourite – his dog. The second story is based on a humorous Estonian song and tells the story of a land herring that became a sea creature and made the seawater salty. The third story is based on a Czech fairy-tale, which tells of two boys, who find a witch's broom and start to fly with it.

Willi Carlisle plays live at MerleFest in Window World Hall at Wilkes Community College in Wilkesboro, NC on April 26, 2024. Set List: 1. Higher Lonesome 2. I Want No Children 3. Critterland

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