A documentary on Barbara Morrison by filmmaker Tony Villani focuses on the life and career of the jazz and blues legend. (Video still by Tony Villani)
A documentary about jazz and blues legend Barbara Morrison and her impact on music and humanity, is in the works. Filmmaker Tony Villani and Tim Morganfield, CEO of the Barbara Morrison Performing Arts Center and the California Jazz and Blues Museum, lead a shared effort to keep “the Queen of Leimert Park’s” universal message of love and community alive.
Filmmaker Tony Villani (at center) held a benefit concert at Matter Studio Gallery last month, to raise funds to complete his documentary on Barbara Morrison. (Photo by Karla Funderburk)
In 2020, while working on his upcoming film, “BlackAngelCity, Stories from Black LA,” filmmaker Tony Villani visited Leimert Park Village and stumbled upon the California Jazz and Blues Museum, one of many projects the late Barbara Morrison had led to enhance her L.A. community. While Villani wondered how to approach the jazz and blues legend and ask her to be a part of his film, he was summoned to meet her.
“This guy taps me on the shoulder and says, ‘She wants to talk to you,’ and I had no idea who he was talking about,” recalls Villani. “I turned around and there she was. She said, ‘Come with me – I want to show you something.’ She takes me to her place and shows me pictures of the greats of jazz that lined her hallway. She started … telling me who they were, but I knew a fair number of them, so at one point, we just started talking about life.
Related Links:
https://matterstudiogallery.com
https://culture.lacity.gov/cultural-centers/vision-theatre/
https://vimeo.com/908274082/c9cac97097
https://californiajazzandbluesmuseum.com
Vocalist Frieda Lee graced the benefit concert to raise funds to complete a documentary on Barbara Morrison. From left are Hiro Morozumi, Jeff Littleton, Ms. Lee, and Jerrell Ballard. (Photo by Donna Dymally)
“One time I said, ‘Barbara, I’d like to do an interview with you for this project.’ We did this interview that covered her career, her life, her youth, but also the community, the work that she was doing within the community. It was very exciting, and then she passed. Almost immediately, I started thinking, ‘I have to do something about Barbara.’”
Villani’s documentary, “Barbara: Life is Music” is in the editing stage, featuring interviews with Morrison and a diverse sample of the lives she touched. With the assistance of Tim Morganfield, Barbara’s assistant since 2009 and CEO of the museum and the Barbara Morrison Performing Arts Center, Villani gathered 64 musical and visual artists to speak about their experiences with Barbara in the film, and gained access to the singer’s archive of photos, video and other materials for the documentary. The artists appearing in the film include vocalist Elaine Gibbs, musician and actor Jay Jackson; blues guitarist Bernie Pearl; photographer Donna Dymally; artist James Chitty; and veteran deejay and vocalist James Janisse.
Mary Harris is among the artists who donated their work to raise funds for the documentary, “Barbara: Life is Music.” (Photo by Donna Dymally)
Morganfield is the program coordinator for the Vision Theater operated by the L.A. Department of Cultural Affairs. Morrison had initially hired him to build stages for her performing arts center, and they bonded in part, over his kinship to Muddy Waters, with whom she had always wanted to perform.
Under Morganfield’s leadership, the California Jazz and Blues Museum, which closed during the pandemic, has since been offering pop-up exhibits at the Hollywood Bowl, Walt Disney Concert Hall, the Long Beach Jazz Festival, and the Dymally Jazz Festival, and is set to reopen soon in a new 2,000 square foot building on Leimert Blvd. The Barbara Morrison Performing Arts Center has remained open throughout and provides local musicians an opportunity to perform in front of a real audience.
The designation of Barbara Morrison Square was celebrated on Sept. 10, 2022 at the intersection of 42nd and Degnan in Leimert Park, with Councilwoman Heather Hutt (second from right) and Tim Morganfield, CEO, California Jazz and Blues Museum and the Barbara Morrison Performing Arts Center (at center, holding plaque). (Photo by Ian Foxx)
“Barbara always wanted a stage for the community, a stage for people who never had the chance [to perform onstage],” says Morganfield. “[The] fourth Thursday of the month is open for an artist … who is performing on the streets.
“She was a person who always tried to bring the community together,” says Morganfield. “Creating the Barbara Morrison Performing Arts Center was to bring people together, as one.”
A benefit was held to raise funds to complete the documentary on Feb. 23 at Matter Studio Gallery in Los Angeles, with authentic New Orleans cuisine by Chef Alice Smith. A wide range of Los Angeles artists donated their artwork to raise funds, including Mary Harris, Jim Chitty, George Evans, Kahil Shareem, Talita Long, and Woody Johnson. The artworks can still be purchased by contacting Karla Funderburk at Matter Studio Gallery at 323-697-4988.
Funderburk, who owns the gallery, also donated her artwork to the benefit.
“I have heard [Barbara] perform … I witnessed her magnificence,” she says. “And now I know what a magnet she was in the community. The important thing is to complete this beautiful film.”
Barbara Morrison originally hired Tim Morganfield to build stages for her; today, he serves as CEO of the California Jazz and Blues Museum and the Barbara Morrison Performing Arts Center; pictured around 2010. (Courtesy of Karen Clark)
Karen Clark, Morganfield’s partner, says that the museum and the Center was and continues to be a hub for the community, where the embracing spirit of Morrison, who passed away in 2022, lives on.
“People came by that center all the time, just to get a dose of hope, a dose of inspiration,” she says. “When Barbara passed, there were people at that center coming by crying, just wanting to once again feel or touch or see a person who loved them, cared about them, made a way for [them].
“For hardcore jazz and blues fans, Barbara was a household name, but for a lot of people who don’t know jazz and blues … it’s another beautiful American story,” says Clark. “If you are determined… you can achieve anything that you want. Barbara was so determined that she could make it happen, she could get it done.”
Barbara Morrison (at left) with Karen Clark at the Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival in 2019. (Courtesy of Karen Clark)
With “Barbara: Life is Music,” Villani wants, “to bring her back alive. I don’t want people to think about the past … as much as feel the energy, the presence, and the power of this woman.” He is inspired by Morrison’s work ethic and hopes to honor her through not only the documentary but in the way that he achieves it.
“It’s a labor of love, so I’ve got to do it right,” he says. “She was always looking forward and … always wanted to give, to be there… to work hard. If you worked for Barbara, you wanted to do your best because she wouldn’t have taken anything less than that.
Chef Alice Smith of New Orleans (at center) catered the benefit concert at Matter Studio Gallery. From left are Karla Funderburk, owner, Matter Studio Gallery; Smith, and Tony Villani, filmmaker. (Photo by Mello Bluez Houston)
“I always felt, with Barbara, that you wanted to give her something back because if she liked you, she gave you all she had … her friendship, she gave you understanding; she would listen to you. The shining example was her resilience, her being indomitable, her being sometimes outrageous, other times, really motherly. It was this vibrant human being that got everybody involved.”
To donate to the film project, “Barbara: Music is Life,” contact Karla Funderburk at 323-697-4988.
