Van Eps Footage Arrives
April 3, 2007
Rich Remsberg, the Image Researcher for “North Carolina Rambler,” made me a happy director when a screener of a five minute segment of the Fred Van Eps Trio showed at my front door. Fred Van Eps was one of the great banjoists on early recordings and one of Charlie Poole’s heroes and primary influences.
In 1921 the Van Eps Trio was the subject of the earliest known filmed popular music performance with synchronized sound, the short subject “A Bit of Jazz” made by talking picture pioneer O.T. Kellum. Plan to see plenty of this amazing footage in the finished documentary about Poole.
