This film includes a rehearsal session with Sister Sledge (teenagers
at the time). The video below shows Kathy twice. And she was not shy
on the dance floor...nice moves though.

link1:
http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid452319854/bctid175759449
3

link2:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122039730415792753.html?
mod=googlenews_wsj

FILM
The Pre-Rumble in the Jungle
By JESSE DRUCKER
September 3, 2008; Page D9

The legendary 1974 "Rumble in the Jungle" between Muhammad Ali and
George Foreman in Zaire was preceded by a three-day
concert, "Zaire '74," featuring some of greatest musical artists of
the time: James Brown, B.B. King, the Spinners, Bill Withers, the
Fania All-Stars, Miriam Makeba and a variety of Zairian artists, like
François "Franco" Luambo Makiadi. The heavyweight bout was
immortalized by Leon Gast's superb 1996 documentary "When We Were
Kings," and now there is a stunning new film co-produced by Mr. Gast
and dedicated to the unique and, until now, oddly overlooked musical
event.


Antidote Films
James Brown, Godfather of Soul, on stage at the 'Zaire '74' music
festival.
"Soul Power" will have its premiere at the Toronto Film Festival
tomorrow and marks the directorial debut of Jeffrey Levy-Hinte, an
editor on "When We Were Kings" and a producer of such films as this
year's well-received documentary "Polanski."

It bothered him for years that "there was this whole realm of music
and performance and experience of the artists that was only mildly
touched upon in ["When We Were Kings]," Mr. Levy-Hinte recalled.
Then, two years ago, "I woke up one morning and said 'It's time.'"

Thus began the odyssey of creating a documentary from that unused
footage, whose shooting had been overseen by Mr. Gast. Nearly 60 of
the more than 120 hours filmed were of the concert, but the extensive
reports and slating that typically make it easy to match a film's
footage with its sound rolls were missing -- along with a third of
the film. The movie's editor, David Smith, spent more than four
months with a crew of interns painstakingly piecing together the film
with its accompanying sound. Mr. Levy-Hinte also tracked down the
lost material.


See a clip from the movie, "Soul Power."
The concert was organized by record producer Stewart Levine and the
renowned South African musician Hugh Masekela, his longtime
friend. "It was just a whim, man!" Mr. Levine says now. "It was
insane and I was kind of in the center of the storm."

Originally, the show was scheduled to take place during the three
days before the fight. But Mr. Foreman suffered a cut above his eye
during a training round, delaying the bout for six weeks. In "Soul
Power," we see Mr. Levine learn of the delay but decide not to tell
any of the musicians. The long plane ride to Zaire looks like a
madhouse, featuring music in the aisles by the Fania All-Stars,
including Celia Cruz, Johnny Pacheco and Yomo Toro. The flight also
could have been a disaster, as the plane was weighed down by more
than 30,000 pounds of unexpected musical equipment for Brown.

"Soul Power" opens with Brown. This is Brown near the end of his last
great burst of creative energy, before he -- along with much of the
classic soul music scene on display here -- was overtaken by the
disco that Brown himself helped spawn. He turns in his customary
splits and endurance-testing screams, accompanied by some of his best
musicians, like trombonist Fred Wesley and saxophonist Maceo Parker.
He exhorts his band in trademark style -- "Fellas! Fellas! Fellas! I
wanna get up and do my thing!" -- wearing a skin-tight outfit
emblazoned with the initials GFOS, for Godfather of Soul, and a
choker monogrammed with J.B. His walk off the stage and into his
dressing room after the show, like an exhausted heavyweight champion,
is captured in one long, remarkable sequence filmed by the
incomparable Albert Maysles.

Other stars also emerge. Philippé Wynne, the Spinners' intense and
often underrated lead singer, is riveting to watch. He and the group
deliver a joyous improvisation at a party in Kinshasa: "We, the
Spinners, came a long way/Got a chance to stand here in our home
today/Wanna shout about it . . ." He takes off his Coke-bottle
glasses to take part in a preconcert hand-clasping prayer with the
rest of the group, all clad in silver jackets, before taking the
stage for "One of a Kind Love Affair." In another scene, he actually
spars with Mr. Ali.

B.B. King is intense during his performance of the "Thrill Is Gone."
Miriam Makeba exudes charm onstage and off. And we see Ray Barretto
pound his congas during the Fania All-Stars' performance. Another
treat is a rehearsal session of a then-teenage girl group, barely
known at the time: Sister Sledge.

Other memorable characters emerge as well, including Keith Bradshaw,
the unsmiling and fierce "investors representative" for the Liberians
who bankrolled the show.

Find television listings for James Brown at LocateTV.And of course
there is Mr. Ali, whose outsized charisma makes him dominate his few
scenes. We see him argue with his corner man Drew "Bundini" Brown,
telling him that he is not truly free as a black American in the U.S.
He brings flair even to batting away flies as he kills time waiting
for Mr. Foreman to heal: "Flies are faster here than they are in the
States," he notes. "They eat too much in America -- they lazy. These
flies here don't get enough to eat; they stay hungry and fast." We
see the crowd part like the Red Sea to make way for Mr. Ali as he
greets James Brown at the airport.

That black American musicians are triumphantly returning home to
Africa is a strong theme throughout the film, stated by several of
the artists during the trip. "We want to thank all the black people
that it took to make it possible for us to come back home," says
Wynne, choking up in the dressing room after the Spinners'
performance. But reflecting on the experience today, Mr. Withers, for
one, is less romantic. "The only exchange between the Zairians and
most of us," he tells me, "was if you bought something. So it was
like a bunch of American people hanging around the hotel." And life
under the dictatorship of Mobutu Sese Seko also created some
unease. "The one thing that struck me was the opulence of Mobutu and
the absolute lack of it with the regular people," Mr. Withers says.

Nevertheless, the party for the musicians went on. "We partied from
the time we got there until the time we left," Mr. Wesley, Mr.
Brown's bandleader at the time, recalls when we talk. "I can't tell
you all what we did, because some was illegal and some was immoral,
but we had big fun." Indeed, Mr. Levine tells me that the departing
musicians left behind an unpaid $225,000 hotel bill that led to his
house arrest for 10 days, until he was sneaked onto a flight to Italy.

Mr. Levine, who has recently moved from his long career as a record
producer to filmmaking, says of "Soul Power": "It's a documentation
of a different time -- when people really valued the impact of music."

Mr. Drucker is a reporter in the Journal's New York bureau.

Write to Jesse Drucker at jesse.drucker@...

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