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The Independent Film Festival Boston has been a major showcase for short films from New England and beyond. Here’s a roundup of one of this year’s programs, “Shorts Dartmouth: Narrative” (collections are named after streets in the Back Bay). There’s not a weak one in the five-film bunch.
Perhaps “Izipho Zam (My Gifts)” might have become as well known as Pharoah Sanders’s “Karma” — if Impulse! rather than the tiny cooperative label Strata-East had recorded it.
The emphasis of the B&P troupe has become increasingly apocalyptic: the struggle we are engaged in is for nothing less than the preservation of our planet, and for the preservation of our individual — and collective ––hearts and minds.
While he paints, Stanley Whitney listens to and is inspired by jazz. Miles Davis’s album “Bitches Brew” is his constant companion in the studio.
These Stata-East recordings are the result of a special moment in the history of jazz, when some musicians brilliantly took charge of their own careers. Luckily for us, the music is still strikingly fresh and contemporary.
This week’s poem: Martha McCollough’s “always the “schaden “never the “freude”
The not-to-be missed “Symphonic Chronicles IV” is a very welcome alternative to much of the atonal, modern classical music currently flooding the market.
Sunday’s 100-minute show at Crystal Ballroom offered a celebration of what Gang of Four means for its surviving original members and followers alike, including newer generations represented onstage as well as in the packed hall.
The future for documentaries looks troubling, but the IFFBoston perseveres.
Arts Commentary: From the Editor’s Desk — By Popular Demand, 2025
Back in February of 2024 I began to write a weekly column for AF newsletter on Substack. A few readers have asked that I post these opinion pieces in the magazine. Here is a selection of my favorites of 2025
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