[Louis Gottlieb piano pedagogy]

Footage of Louis Gottlieb, musician, comedian, and founder of the Morningstar Commune, a ranch near San Francisco that allowed all who needed or wanted a new home to live there. Gottlieb demonstrates piano techniques for a proposed instructional video and then discusses the history of Morningstar and the state of the commune movement in the United States.

00:01Copy video clip URL No audio. Footage of Louis Gottlieb’s hands playing a piano, shot from above. 

01:22Copy video clip URL Audio. Gottlieb’s hands playing a piano, shot from above. 

02:22Copy video clip URL The song played again. 

03:23Copy video clip URL Footage of a small park, shot through a window. 

03:51Copy video clip URL The song played again.

04:49Copy video clip URL The song played again.

05:47Copy video clip URL The song played again, hands filmed from a low angle.

06:46Copy video clip URL The song played again, medium shot of Gottlieb, shirtless, as he plays. 

07:41Copy video clip URL The song played again, hands filmed from the side in close-up. 

08:45Copy video clip URL The song played again, the n0w-naked Gottlieb filmed from behind. 

09:43Copy video clip URL Scott Joplin’s “The Entertainer,” hands filmed from above. Gottlieb now appears to be wearing pajamas. Played again, filmed from the same angle. 

12:50Copy video clip URL “The Entertainer” played again, hands shot in close-up from below. 

13:37Copy video clip URL Played again, Gottlieb filmed in medium shot from the side. He is now shirtless again. 

14:23Copy video clip URL Played again, hands filmed from the side in close-up. 

15:40Copy video clip URL Gottlieb plays more songs, including “Painting the Clouds with Sunshine,” which he sings. Two people linger behind him. The camera wanders the room. Gottlieb discusses hearing the song as a child in the 1920s. Then he plays another song. 

19:37Copy video clip URL Gottlieb delivers an introduction to the camera for a “a demonstration tape of a new idea in piano pedagogy, specifically a close visual analysis of pianistic virtuosity utilizing state-of-the-art techniques in video production.” It is devised for home and institutional use, he says, but could also be broadcast on television. He repeats the introduction from a slightly different angle. He discusses the different angles and possible visuals, including animation. 

25:54Copy video clip URL Gottlieb, again shirtless, demonstrates exercises to practice wrist rotation. He repeats the explanation and demonstration several times. 

30:42Copy video clip URL Young skateboarders and roller skaters on the sidewalk below, filmed through the window. 

33:07Copy video clip URL Gottlieb sings “Painting the Clouds with Sunshine” again. Then he discusses founding Morningstar Commune in the early 1960s and the early history of the commune, including eventually leaving the community to tour with folk singer Glenn Yarbrough in 1970. He asserts that the idea of “an open, intentional community is very much in the American tradition… I think that if you take certain coordinates on the earth’s surface and just say ‘Permission to live here not required,’ why you’ll have a wonderful bunch of people in a very short time.” He talks about his religious faith and religious practices in various religions. Legal actions against the commune from their neighbors. 

42:25Copy video clip URL The new owner’s use of Morningstar and thoughts on the commune’s efforts. 

46:25Copy video clip URL The commune movement’s growth. 

47:28Copy video clip URL Gottlieb sings “I’m in the Mood for Love,” lightly imitating Louis Armstrong. 

49:20Copy video clip URL Discussion of the Oneida Community, a 19th century religious communal society founded by John Humphrey Noyes, and the Bruderhof, a German community started in the 1920s. The community as “the real idea of Lord Shiva’s omnipotent creative imagination.” Further discussion of Shiva and the Hindu faith. 

56:00Copy video clip URL Filming on the sidewalk outside of an art museum. Dudley Evenson holds up a small display case of cassette tapes released by their label. The display reads “Soundings of the Planet. Earthlab.” She plays her harp and sings and climbs on an outdoor sculpture. Their children play in the grass and climb on the sculpture.