Recently had the pleasure of watching Bill Frisell play the music he composed to go with the film The Great Flood by Bill Morrison. Playing with Bill was Ron Miles on trumpet, Tony Scherr on bass, and Kenny Wollesen on drums.
It was a moving experience. “Steeped in America’s roots music yet with a distinctive voice of his own, Bill Frisell stands “at the very epicenter of modern American music” (BBC) as a guitarist, composer and collaborator on a diverse range of projects. In The Great Flood, he and filmmaker Bill Morrison (Decasia, Block Ice and Propane) contemplate the 1927 flood of the Mississippi River, which caused unprecedented death and destruction but also brought the Delta Blues north with migrating Southern blacks. Frisell and a brilliant small ensemble perform a suite of songs to accompany the film, which captures the flood’s impact on people and the land through expressive use of deteriorating archival footage.”