About The Film

In the summer of 2008, I heard Ben interviewed on NPR.

That was the summer my best friend and companion dog of 13 years was dying and my whole world was terribly dark. Ben introduced his song “Panning for Gold”. He spoke about his grandparents and how they both had early stage dementia and kept forgetting things. From that experience this song was written.

Then he sang the song.

As he sang Panning for Gold, it felt like someone had just turned on the sun.

I went right out and bought his CD and that is where it all began…

I believe Ben is one of the most exciting musicians around. He is unafraid to stretch himself, find new sound, new words and new ways to communicate our human conditions.

He is an electric performer and a deeply generous musician. He speaks of Kentucky, where he was born and raised, as a state that has had a strong influence on his music. He calls Kentucky ever changing, voluptous and rich. I believe those are three perfect words to describe his music.

He cares deeply about the environment, music education, collaborative art projects and things that are just basically good.

Credits

Director / Producer: Kyia Clayton

Kyia graduated from North Carolina School of the Arts with a four year diploma in Acting. She then moved to Los Angeles and found herself working in Film and TV Production. Moving on to NYC and working for an independent documentary film maker, the love of documentary film-making grew.

In 1997, she moved to Australia and lived there for the next 10 years. While in Australia she enjoyed a career in voice-over and audio book narration. She also worked two seasons for the Melbourne International Festival of the Arts, toured her one woman show “A Room Full of Monkeys”  and successfully launched a charitable foundation for the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (ACCA).

Upon returning to the US in 2006, she began her own film production company, My Do It Productions, a name that came from a phrase her two and a half year old daughter repeated frequently that year! She has made 2 short documentaries I Am Not a Boy and Plain Ride Penn. Plain Ride Penn received Official Selection of the 2009 Newport Beach Film Festival. Wooden Box – a documentary about Ben Sollee, is her first full length documentary that is due to be released in February 2010.

She is a published playwright, a stage and TV actress, the co-founder of the “Fresh French Shorts” Film Festival in Portland, OR and  foremost an emerging film maker.
She and her husband, daughter, dog and cat live together in beautiful San Francisco.

Executive Producer: Gill Holland

Independent film producer Gill Holland moved to Louisville in 2005 from NYC and went on to open The Green Building here, probably the greenest commercial building in Kentucky (anticipating LEED platinum certification).

A Spirit Award nominee for producer of the year (the Oscars for independent films), Gill has worked on two notable environmental documentaries: MOUNTAIN TOP REMOVAL won Al Gore’s Reel Current Award for best doc of 2007 and FLOW: FOR LOVE OF WATER was in theaters across the country in 2008.

Gill is a former lawyer, has produced over 50 films and runs sonaBLAST! Records (featuring CDs made with recycled plastic and cardboard cases) and is obsessed over his compost earthworms. He and his wife Augusta and daughter Cora have landmarked several buildings in “NuLu” and are also starting up the Jefferson Public Market, a year round public/farmers market here in Louisville’s East Market District.

Producer: Kevin Biggerstaff

Editor: John Trusso

Cinematography: John Trusso, Braelan Murray, Chase Wiseman

Concert Sound Engineers: Portland- Craig Harding (September Media) , San Francisco - Eddie (K9Sound)

Additional Footage: Ben Sollee, Bill Weigandt, Kyia Clayton

Assistant Director – (Kentucky): Bill Weigandt

Co-Produced: Cinema Crime