The 26th Annual Sundance ASCAP Music Café Electrifies the 2024 Sundance Film Festival

The 40^th Anniversary of the Sundance Film Festival drew tens of thousands of cinema-loving throngs to the snowy streets of Park City, Utah from January 18 to 28, to see 91 features and more, proving yet again independent film’s creative power and appeal. As it has for 26 years of the festival, the Sundance ASCAP Music Café celebrated music’s essential role in film and charged up this year’s audiences with two days of powerful live performances by songwriters and bands and conversations with composers and filmmakers at the Acura House of Energy.

Presented in partnership with Acura, longtime Presenting Sponsor and Official Vehicle of Sundance Film Festival, the Café, which was packed for two consecutive days on January 21-22, spotlighted some of today’s most exciting musical storytellers, including a rollicking performance from the DIG! XX Dandy Jonestown Revue, comprised of members from the dueling rock bands featured in the Sundance Film Festival 2004 Grand Jury Award-winning rock documentary DIG!.  Introduced by that film’s director, Ondi Timoner, the group took to the stage to celebrate the 20th anniversary edition of the film, DIG! XX, which premiered at this year’s festival featuring 40 minutes of previously unseen footage.

Also appearing on the Sundance ASCAP Music Café stage was indie singer-songwriter Evan Bartels, whose music takes an unflinching look at the deepest parts of the human experience; Americana supergroup Fantastic Cat, four songwriters who mix genres and decades in their musical collaborations; acclaimed folk singer-songwriter Mary Scholz and the charismatic Nigerian-American singer-songwriter Ogi.

ASCAP also presented Screen Time Conversations with composers and filmmakers with work in this year’s festival, including Will & Harper Composer Nathan Halpern, As We Speak artist Kemba and producer-director J.M. Harper, and Union composer Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe with co-directors Brett Story and Stephen Maing. Kemba performed a special spoken word piece at the end of his panel appearance. And Amazon Labor Union President, Chris Smalls, who is featured in the Union documentary, wowed the crowd with an unexpected rap performance that raised the roof.

This year’s Sundance awards were announced on Friday, January 26. ASCAP composers whose music graced many of this year’s winning films in the top categories included: Giosuè Greco, who scored Didi, which won the Audience Award: U.S. Dramatic and the U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Award: Ensemble; Uno Helmersson, who scored Ibelin, winner of the Audience Award: World Cinema Documentary and the Directing Award: World Cinema Documentary; Sneha Khanwalkar, who created the music for Girls Will Be Girls, which won the Audience Award: World Cinema Dramatic along with the World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award for Acting; and Mikey J, who scored the music for Kneecap, which won the Audience Award: NEXT.

Union, co-directed by Brett Story and Stephen Maing and scored by ASCAP composer Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe, all who took part in a Screen Time Conversation at the Sundance ASCAP Music Café on January 21, took home the U.S. Documentary Special Jury Award for the Art of Change.

Este Haim and Christopher Stracey scored the music for Suncoast, a charming and moving film featuring the young actress Nico Parker, who received the U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Award for Breakthrough Performance. The musical collaborators previously took part in an ASCAP Screen Time Conversation for the 2022 Sundance festival.

ASCAP composer Peter Raeburn received a World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award for Original Music for his score to Handling the Undead. And in the same category, Frederic Alvarez scored In the Land of Brothers, which won the Directing Award: World Cinema Dramatic.

Other ASCAP composers with work in top honored films included Nainita Desai, who scored Nocturnes, which won the World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for Craft (Nainita sat for an interview at last year’s festival with The Deepest Breath director Laura McGann); and OLAV ØYEHAUG, who scored A New Kind of Wilderness, which won the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize: Documentary.

And in the Short Film Awards category, Seth Kaplan and Chris Bailoni scored the music for Bob’s Funeral, which won the Short Film Jury Award: Nonfiction, and Natasha Jacobs created music for the Bug Diner, which won the Short Film Jury Award: Animation.

Read about all of the ASCAP composers who powered the 2024 Sundance Film Festival selections.

For a full list of this year’s Sundance Film Festival award winners, go here.