Most people haven’t themed their weeks at all, but Ryan McNeil of The Matinee opted to give me a double feature of concert/music docs, which is almost prescient, since I’ve recently been really interested to see more of those. Both of these two would’ve been high on my list, so I’m glad he pushed me toward them.

The Last Waltz is the record of The Band’s final concert in 1978, and one of the first times a single band’s concert was filmed and released in theatres (of course Woodstock and Monterey Pop predate The Last Waltz). Martin Scorsese directed (his interest in music has resulted in several other music-related documentaries since this), and captured the joy and energy of the concert with some great cinematography despite having to be careful not to interfere with the concert from the live audience’s point of view.

tf-band-guitar