SUMMER OF SOUL
The perfect chaser to the horror of Woodstock ‘99 is SUMMER OF SOUL (trailer here), Questlove’s hit documentary about the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival. Archival footage of the festival shows a celebration of Black music and culture with awesome performances by icons like Stevie Wonder, Sly Stone, and Nina Simone. Interviews with attendees of the festival describe the event as rapturous, even mythical, and that experience is apparent from the recordings. If given the choice to travel back in time to either Woodstock ‘99 or the Harlem Cultural Festival, I’d have to go with Harlem–but if Sugar Ray had made it to Woodstock ‘99, I might have a different answer.
—Nolan Russell, Executive Assistant
