Filmmaker Mark Landsman attended schools in the northern suburbs, where he had every advantage when it came to the arts.
During elementary school in Deerfield, he had a teacher who taught him to love music. His high school in Highland Park had a state-of-the-art theater and darkroom, an award-winning orchestra and a drama department that had several students who went on to found the Steppenwolf Theatre Company.
But, as an adult, Landsman served as an artist-in-residence in school systems so underprivileged they couldn’t afford full-time teachers for arts programs.
So it should come as no surprise that Landsman would be drawn to the remarkable story of Houston teacher Conrad “Prof” Johnson, who, in the 1970s, taught a ragtag group of black students to believe in music and in themselves. And Johnson did it — winning more than 40 competitions between 1971 and 1978 — on a threadbare budget with very few bells and whistles.
Landsman, who now lives in Los Angeles, was back in Chicago over the weekend for the premiere of his award-winning documentary, “Thunder Soul,” at the Chicago International Film Festival.
“For me, and maybe what’s at the heart of this film, is that music and arts education shouldn’t be a privilege but a right,” Landsman said. “It’s so important to invest in the creative process at the earliest point possible, and Prof knew that.”
Landsman, 43, has been making documentaries centering on youth and social justice for 13 years. But unlike his other projects, the story of the Kashmere High School Stage Band sort of found him.
In 2007, Landsman was in his office listening to the radio when he happened upon a news story about the band. The students’ sophisticated melding of jazz and funk nearly blew him away.
“There was this incredible big-band funk music,” Landsman said. “I thought it was one of the obvious bands from the ’70s, and then the reporter said these were kids from Houston, Texas. The hair on my arms raised, and I thought someone should make this into a movie.”
Once Landsman decided that someone would be him, he initially considered a fictional tale. But when he met Johnson in the fall of 2007 — just weeks before his 92nd birthday — and some of his former students, Landsman knew a documentary would be the best approach.
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While high school stage bands were often all white and veered away from jazz because it seemed too vulgar and hard-core, Johnson, a talented musician in his own right, refused to refine the music or water it down.
Instead, he demanded his students master their instruments (and the language; no “thug talk” was allowed) and encouraged them to play from the heart. Kashmere soon gained recognition for its talented musicians but also the teens’ showmanship and synchronized style.
The band won national championships in 1973 and 1977 and performed in venues around the country and world.
“All of this took money, and in fact, Prof did the fundraising on his own,” Landsman said. “The students would play weddings, bar mitzvahs and cotillions to raise money. They held bake sales, did carwashes and even passed the hat at churches.”
Kashmere, a school that had been struggling in so many regards before the band’s success, suddenly was a force in education. The basketball and football teams won state championships. The debate team, the drama department and the track team also began winning competitions.
During the mid-1970s, students’ grades soared, and so did the number of teens who became members of the National Honor Society.
“In 1975, we had more scholarships offered to students at Kashmere than any other high school in Houston,” one of Johnson’s students says in “Thunder Soul.”
A few months after Landsman began filming, several of Johnson’s former students returned to Kashmere in 2008 — one came from as far as Portugal — to pay tribute to Johnson in a reunion concert.
Landsman said he worried that some, now in their mid-50s, hadn’t picked up their instruments in 30-plus years. During their first rehearsal session, he was standing in the school’s hallway on the telephone with his dad, who’s a musician.
“The band started playing, and I held up my cell phone to let him hear it,” Landsman said. “They had a month before the performance, but we both agreed they had great potential. You don’t play your horn for 30 years, you lose your lip. What we heard at that moment, we knew they would be amazing.”
You’ll have to watch the documentary to understand just how amazing. Landsman said that it’s important that young people see the film. On Wednesday, it will be shown to several groups of Chicago Public Schools students.
“There are teachers who are catalytic figures,” Landsman said. “A spark goes off, and a student is set on a different path. Johnson’s story shows how important that is — particularly in the arts but no matter what you’re doing.”