![Cyrus Moussavi and Hubert Taylor Cyrus Moussavi and Hubert Taylor](/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/2024-06/Cyrus_Hubert.jpg?itok=XrnWlSHL)
Cyrus Moussavi and Hubert Taylor in Conversation
Watch the event here.
Part of our Traditions Talks! Series
Join us in conversation with Cyrus Moussavi and Hubert Taylor as we discuss their documentary Somebody's Gone, a film about the great spiritual singer Brother Theotis Taylor, told through a remarkable archive of footage shot by his son, Hubert.
Somebody's Gone:
Brother Theotis Taylor harvested turpentine, preached sermons, and sang spirituals in a sublime falsetto that made him the pride of South Georgia. Driven by a divine vision, his son, Hubert, filmed it all. Forty years later, Somebody’s Gone is a feature documentary film that completes the story of a great artist through the archive of his prodigal son.
Cyrus Moussavi:
Cyrus Moussavi is an award winning Iranian-American filmmaker and music archivist. His work focuses on overlooked or underheard music, and the larger stories it tells.His short films include "I Snuck Off The Slave Ship", a science-fiction documentary directed in collaboration with the musician and artist Lonnie Holley, which screened at dozens of festivals and galleries including Sundance, BlackStar, and Blum.
Cyrus is currently in production on his first feature film, Somebody’s Gone, a documentary about the great Georgia spiritual singer Brother Theotis Taylor, told through the vast video archive of his son (and co-director) Hubert Taylor. The film is supported by Creative Capital, Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program, the AXS Film Fund, Bay Area Video Access Coalition, and Points North Fellowship,
He is the founder of Raw Music International, a documentary collective creating films about underground music around the world. Their work, from Mongolia, Myanmar, Kenya, Iraq, and Ukraine, has featured at film festivals, screenings, and publications like Time, Wall Street Journal, and NBC News.
Since 2019, he has run Mississippi Records, an independent archival record label that has been releasing music by totally original (and as a result often overlooked) artists for nearly 20 years. He is dedicated to working directly with artists and their families, securing their legal rights and creating equitable documents of their work to share with the world.
Cyrus grew up between Iowa and Iran. He studied economics and philosophy at Columbia, oral history and migration on a Fulbright grant in Amsterdam, and worked as a translator with migrants in Greece. He is based in New York.
Hubert Taylor:
Hubert Taylor was born and raised in a musical family in Fitzgerald, Georgia, where he still lives today. Hubert has served in the Navy during the Vietnam War, and spent time as a record producer, musician, cameraman, high school cheerleading coach, and martial arts educator. Somebody's Gone is his first feature production, for which he is a 2022 Points North Fellow and Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program Grantee.