Blind Film #9: Genghis Blues

Paul Pena's story is a good one. With a background playing Portuguese music, American blues and rock, he became obsessed with Tuvan throat singing back when few westerners had ever heard of it. My pick for most moving scene from this film is when Pena uses a Braille reader on a page of Tuvan text, then on a Tuvan-Russian dictionary before he can translate the Russian translation into English, I identify with the obsessive quality that drives someone with low vision to take great pains (and yes, it is a little bit painful) to do something like that.

R.I.P. Paul Pena and Kongar-Ol Ondar. Thanks for bringing so many of the planet's great musicians together and for sharing your brilliant artistic visions with the world.