Hello, I'm John McGrath.

I'm a producer for Kansas City PBS.

And today on Art House, we're talking about the documentary Kansas City Dreamin.

Kansas City Dreamin was directed by Diallo Giovanni French.

And we sat down with the filmmaker to talk about this amazing documentary.

And then we follow Diallo to the Kansas City Juneteenth Film Fest where he lives.

Every filmmaker's dream showing his film in front of a live audience.

Oh.

Let me tell you about Kansas City.

Whoa.

Wait here.

Another day.

I take your feet away.

Kansas City Dreamin is a music documentary about the African-American music history of the city.

So we basically start the film with, you know, the early days of sort of jazz evolving here in the 1920s and 30s, all the way up to current artists like, you know, Monet, take nine, Bobby Watson, Marty McFadden, Lee Adams.

So it's a celebration of really just like the city's black music, Kansas City has produced a lot of wonderful, successful people.

So, you know, I'm a music photographer, like we talked about, and I started in 2006 just going around, photographing different musicians, in the Blue Room, mostly as a foundation.

And then also that chance to photograph national musicians like, you know, Monet and and take I over the course of like ten years, I developed a nice little archive of photographs of everybody from Sheila E to buddy Guy to Duran Duran to, I mean, everybody.

And so I said, well, let me put these in a film.

And so that was kind of the the nucleus of the city during the.

So I did as a short film, first in 2016.

And the short film really centered around Bobby Watson.

And in 2020, I decided to make it into a cool new.

you know, it's sort of so the rest of the world as well as Kansas City, that how important we are to American music.

came.

Diplomacy.

You got some incredible musicians here.

You know, Janelle Monet is from here.

Yeah.

So.

Because I photograph I develop relationships with them.

so it was easy to get them in the film because, you know, they knew me, and I take pictures of them, and they'd like to take you, right?

Taking them.

So it all kind of fell into place.

And tonight is 88 days since birth.

Born and raised in Kansas City, Missouri.

like I said, I went to high school.

I still call them Eric.

When I woke up, I dropped him like he never took the and I watched him go from, like, the great dancer to being this local rap artist to being known all over the world.

I started Strange Music because I was tired of going through the rigmarole with the majors, and I wanted to show them what I was trying to show them.

Like, this is how you do this strange music.

A lot of people don't realize that his record company gets out with some, strange music is I mean, it's it's all compounds, and they have like 8 or 9 buildings.

They have a soundstage recording studio, they have a big warehouse where they do all their marketing and merchandise.

And it is I believe it is the biggest independent record label in the world, and it's right here in D.C. so it's crazy.

Want to build it in KC?

Homegrown means a lot, you know.

You want to be rooted where you're from.

I couldn't see it in any other way.

when I go to other cities and I tell people in the city, you know, sometimes I go like, hey, that's what, six months from?

And I the definition of determination.

using your talents, you can and I learned from him.

So even though we're the same age.

We are at, screening theater for the, as we like.

This is the second annual, Juneteenth film festival a celebration of the Emancipation Proclamation.

So what better opportunity to celebrate black culture through black cinema?

I am so proud of this guy.

He's been making film for a really long time, and it was like my extreme pleasure to include this in the second annual Juneteenth Film Festival.

And they're screening my, music documentary, Kansas City Dreamin, music, and it has to be paid for with the Beatles.

I don't know what I was thinking on that one, but.

But but all of that has to be paid for before it can be distributed.

My goal is for it to be streaming somewhere within the next year.

I don't care if it's two, I don't care.

I want so it's always exciting because you get an audience participation.

There's nothing more gratifying than watching your film with an actual live audience.

much everybody in the film, our friends of mine, we both studied film from the same professor to talk spike Lee.

So this is just my little sort of point of view of some of the musicians that I've met and got a chance to photograph and get to know over the course of the last 20 years.

you a lot.

Thank.