Missa Luba

[stewamax]

Having read of the death late last November of composer Irving Burgie, who co-wrote Harry Belafonte’s “The Banana Boat Song” and other hits for him, I played the former to admire the catchy calypso rhythms.
And then by a circuitous route ended up playing the extraordinary Missa Luba on Youtube that I had never knowingly heard before.

But when I played the Missa Luba's Gloria, I realise that I had: it is the eclectic celebratory chant in Pasolini’s even more extraordinary Gospel According to Matthew; and not just a version of it - it is the actual soundtrack.

[feder1]

I played my LP over and over many decades ago.

It was lovely music but I didn,t know anything about it,s background.

[bungeejumper]

Aaah, happy days. I remember that the Sanctus from Missa Luba featured prominently in Lindsay Anderson's "If", a 1960s film about a violent insurrection at a boys' public school, during which Malcolm McDowell's gang of sixth-formers shoots the headmaster dead during speech day. (Alongside a considerable amount of other anti-establishment gunfire.)

We sat fairly close to the back seats of the cinema, vaguely hoping that our parents wouldn't get to hear about our going to see this thoroughly notorious film. As the lights went up at the end, we were somewhat surprised to see our headmaster sitting alone in the row behind us, and looking very pale.

BJ

[PinkDalek]

[We sat fairly close to the back seats of the cinema, vaguely hoping that our parents wouldn't get to hear about our going to see this thoroughly notorious film. As the lights went up at the end, we were somewhat surprised to see our headmaster sitting alone in the row behind us, and looking very pale.

We weren't surprised to see our headmaster and loads of other teachers had watched. After all, back in those enlightened times, they showed "If" as part of the school's cinema club. I imagine we saw it a year or two post release.

Here are some extracts set to music which unfortunately is not high quality (This version reasonably safe for family viewing but I have seen the full café scene somewhere or other recently):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZzHbkHvHus

The Wiki page is informative https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/If....

Captain Mainwaring played the housemaster just before Dad's Army!

Trigger's Father also featured.

Excellent film, especially for those who were boarding at the time. "Stop tarting Collins" was the quote of the day. My apologies to him if he's reading this.