Channel 4
I Was There When...
2017
[Commercial work]
I Was There When...
2017
[Commercial work]
A documentary-series about key moments in history that changed music culture. The launch episode uncovers how the death of disco gave birth to house.
'I Was There When [......]' is a docu-series format pitched by our head of Pi Studios, Ravi Amaratunga Hitchcock. We only made a pilot episode in the end. A shame, but still an amazing project to be part of.
Ep.1 tells of how a baseball half-time show called ‘Disco Demolition’, in which thousands of disco records were blown-up, morphed into a racially-motivated display that forced a predominantly black disco scene into the shadows. Over the next few years, that scene stewed and mutated and eventually re-emerged under a new banner – house music – which would take the world by storm.
My role in the project was as a researcher and writer, helping facilitate the narrative arc with info and interview recommendations, and finding the best structure for the story.
We hosted a screening at FC Hyena in Amsterdam, where house legend Jesse Saunders came all the way from Chicago for the party. And boy can he still party.
Click here to watch Episode 1 on All4.
Creative Studio ︎︎︎ Pi Studios
Series Creator ︎︎︎ Ravi Amaratunga Hitchcock
Executive Producer ︎︎︎ Ravi Amaratunga Hitchcock
Design Direction ︎︎︎ Nessim Higson, Jack Samels
Researcher / Scriptwriter ︎︎︎ Tom Bird
Comissioning ︎︎︎ Channel4
Production Company ︎︎︎ All Day Every Day
Producer ︎︎︎ Lucy Sumner
Director ︎︎︎ Jake Sumner
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'I Was There When [......]' is a docu-series format pitched by our head of Pi Studios, Ravi Amaratunga Hitchcock. We only made a pilot episode in the end. A shame, but still an amazing project to be part of.
Ep.1 tells of how a baseball half-time show called ‘Disco Demolition’, in which thousands of disco records were blown-up, morphed into a racially-motivated display that forced a predominantly black disco scene into the shadows. Over the next few years, that scene stewed and mutated and eventually re-emerged under a new banner – house music – which would take the world by storm.
My role in the project was as a researcher and writer, helping facilitate the narrative arc with info and interview recommendations, and finding the best structure for the story.
We hosted a screening at FC Hyena in Amsterdam, where house legend Jesse Saunders came all the way from Chicago for the party. And boy can he still party.
Click here to watch Episode 1 on All4.
Creative Studio ︎︎︎ Pi Studios
Series Creator ︎︎︎ Ravi Amaratunga Hitchcock
Executive Producer ︎︎︎ Ravi Amaratunga Hitchcock
Design Direction ︎︎︎ Nessim Higson, Jack Samels
Researcher / Scriptwriter ︎︎︎ Tom Bird
Comissioning ︎︎︎ Channel4
Production Company ︎︎︎ All Day Every Day
Producer ︎︎︎ Lucy Sumner
Director ︎︎︎ Jake Sumner