The Shaking Ray Levis remain one of America’s unheralded SOUTHERN free-improv treasures. They have been active in performance, teaching, and organizing in the region since 1986. The 1993 Shaking Ray Levis Festival in Chattanooga, Tennessee was one of the most important festivals of the period, featuring sets by Anthony Braxton, “the last working Southern black minstrel” Abner Jay, Caroliner Rainbow and others…far and away beyond the present day Bonnaroos.

Here is a 20-minute mini-documentary about the festival by filmmaker Michael Johnson.

BONUS CLIP: An excerpt from one of Derek Bailey’s final USA performances, at Tonic in NYC with the Shaking Ray Levis in 2003…