Music & Film

A poster for the musical Stormy Weather

Celebrating the Nicholas Brothers

A compilation tribute to the extraordinary dance team of Fayard and Harold Nicholas

Still from Fuji (1974)

Remembering Robert Breer and Donald Krim

Looking at the careers of an avant-garde animator and a crucial film distributor

Emil Jannings in Ernst Lubitsch's The Loves of Pharaoh

Lost and Found: HBO and Ernst Lubitsch

A periodic update of film preservation projects

Gene Autry, known as the Singing Cowboy, epitomized the western star, performing in movies, television and radio for more than three decades.

The Cowboy in Country Music

In his new book, music historian Don Cusic recounts the enduring icons of western music and their indelible mark on pop culture

George Veditz

Using Movies to Debate Sign Language

A 1913 film mirrors contemporary conflicts over how best to teach the deaf

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A Trip to the Moon as You've Never Seen it Before

Frame enlargement from Le Voyage Dans La Lune/A Trip to the Moon

A Trip to the Moon as You’ve Never Seen it Before

One of the landmark films in cinema can now be seen in color

The Smithsonian collection of 8,000-plus instruments includes 5 by Stradivari.

Sound Scholarship

Squeak the Squirrel one of the many educational films available for free online

Where to Find Old Films Online, Streamed Legally and for Free

Thousands of fascinating films are available for free streaming and download, if you know where to look

Martin Luther King, Jr. delivering his famous speech

Screening “I Have a Dream”

It may be difficult to view the entire 17-minute speech online, but two films were made about the March on Washington that highlight that momentous day

From the upcoming Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory: (l to r) Bruce Sinofsky, Damien Echols and Joe Joe Berlinger

Paradise Lost’s Joe Berlinger on the Roots of his West Memphis Three Films

The director of the award-winning documentary reflects on what it was like to film a "real-life Salem Witch Trial"

It's tempting to find hints of Hitchcock's future style in the set design and lighting for The White Shadow.

Behind the Lost Hitchcock Film

Found in a New Zealand archive, the White Shadow offers a glimpse into early film history that extends beyond the famous director

In 1963, author Ken Kesey came up with the idea of leading a cross-country bus trip from California to New York.

Ken Kesey’s Pranksters Take to the Big Screen

It took an Oscar-winning director to make sense of the drug-addled footage shot by the author and his Merry Pranksters

The Champ has been used in experiments to see if depressed people are more likely to cry than non-depressed people.

The Saddest Movie in the World

How do you make someone cry for the sake of science? The answer lies in a young Ricky Schroder

Born in 1940, Levon Helm showed an early gift on the drums. Growing up on a cotton farm, music became his way out of a hard-labor life.

Levon Helm’s Rocking Rambles

The '60s rock great died today. Last July, our writer visited Helm for one of his famous Saturday night music throwdowns

Eddie Van Halen recently donated his custom-made guitar named Frankenstein 2 to the National Museum of American History.

Q and A with Eddie Van Halen

The rock guitarist talks about his custom-made Frankenstein 2 that is now in the collections of the American History museum

A new Folkways album is one of many offerings for the war sesquicentennial.

Civil Discourse

Bob Dylan at the Newport Folk Festival in 1964 where he was an acoustic icon. The following year, he went electric.

The Top 10 Moments of Bob Dylan’s Career

We have selected 10 of the many pivotal events that have shaped his tumultuous life

After minor chart success, the O'Jays had considered calling it quits before Leon Huff and Kenneth Gamble revived their career with chart-topping hits.

Forty Years of Philadelphia Sound

Songwriters Leon Huff and Kenneth Gamble composed tunes with political messages for chart-toppers like the O’Jays and Billy Paul

Alvino Rey may not be a household name today, but Rey's genre-busting fretwork in electric music's nascent years helped set the stage for modern rock.

Alvino Rey’s Musical Legacy

As the father of the electric guitar and grandfather of two members of Arcade Fire, Rey was a major influence on rock for decades

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