Event

Boogie Stomp!

To purchase a full festival pass for $50 which includes all films, concerts, and TEDx Lansing, please visit:

http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/231329

Boogie Stomp! is a documentary film that tells the story of boogie woogie, its origins, subsequent history and ongoing development. Boogie Stomp! also tells the story of the amazing Bob Seeley. Bob Seeley spent his formative years playing with Meade Lux Lewis and other jazz greats in the 1950s and early 60s. Over the years Seeley has become known as the best boogie woogie and stride player in the world. His encyclopedic repertoire and exuberant delivery are unparalleled among contemporary players.

A few years ago Seeley met Bob Baldori at a boogie woogie festival in honor of the late Johnny Johnson, Chuck Berry's original piano player. Baldori had been playing piano and harmonica with Berry since 1966. In addition to fronting his own group he had spent years playing blues, boogie and backbeat rock and roll in Chicago and Detroit. Baldori had been negotiating with a producer to do a documentary series on performing masters who were "under the radar" of pop culture. A biography of Seeley, incorporating the history of blues, boogie, jazz, stride, swing, rock and how all of these forms relate to each other seemed to be a perfect fit.

Boogie Stomp! documents how the basic elements of boogie woogie - rhythm and improvisation over a blues form - became the backbone of American music. It is an exploration of the relationship between blues, jazz, boogie, swing, stride, rock, R & B and contemporary pop music.

The movie also features "live" as well as studio performances of the canon of American blues, boogie and jazz roots by two of the best contemporary players in the world, including Boogie Stomp, Honky Tonk Train, Suitcase Blues, The Fives, Shake That Boogie and many others.