Northampton Jazz Festival’s 2023 Jazz Film Night features Jazz Drummer Legend Max Roach

During this centennial year of jazz drummer, composer, bandleader and social activist Max Roach’s birth, the Northampton Jazz Festival will kick off its 2023 festival season with a newly premiered film, “Max Roach: The Drum Also Waltzes” on June 15 at 7 p.m. at Northampton Center for the Arts, 33 Hawley St.

The film, premiered at the SXSW Film & TV Festival in March, 2023, explores the life and music of Roach, the legendary drummer, composer, bandleader, and social activist through his creative peaks, struggles, and personal reinventions—from the Jim Crow era to the Civil Rights years, plus a survey of the days of post-war modern jazz to hip hop and beyond.

The film is produced and directed by Sam Pollard and Ben Shapiro. Pollard will attend the screening and join Tom Reney, host of NEPM’s Jazz a la Mode, in a question-and-answer session with audience members after the screening.

Pollard is a film director, editor, producer, and screenwriter whose films have garnered numerous awards such as Peabodys, Emmys, and an Academy Award nomination. In 2020, the International Documentary Association honored him with a career achievement award. Spike Lee, whose films Pollard has edited and produced, described him as "a master filmmaker."

Roach’s diverse seven-decade career has marked him as one of the great musical artists of the 20th century and a pioneering cultural activist.

One of the first jazz musicians to teach full -time at the college level, Roach joined the faculty of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, in 1972 as a visiting professor and was one of the founders of the Jazz in July program in improvisation, now celebrating its 41st year. Roach was a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters and was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1995. Roach continued his affiliation with UMass -Amherst until his retirement in 1994.

The film follows Roach through his rich and complicated life, years of now-legendary achievement, deep personal struggle, and the price he paid for his outspoken views. The audience will witness his epic musical journey–—from the revolutionary jazz of the 1940s to the Civil Rights years, and his later-years’ experiments in hip hop and multi-media works.

Many notable jazz artists of his time are featured in the film, including Sonny Rollins, Quincy Jones, Abbey Lincoln, Harry Belafonte, Abdullah Ibrahim, Sonia Sanchez, Randy Weston and Jimmy Heath.

Tickets for the film screening of “Max Roach: The Drum Also Waltzes” are $15 in advance (plus online ticketing fees) or $20 at the door.