Members of Pace University’s award-winning student documentary team, PaceDocs, were featured on the Sunday Sanity version of Andrew Revkin’s Sustain What? podcast, about their recent film, Viola da Terra: Harmony of the Azores, the focus of the popular Producing the Documentary course, which is part of the Dyson College of Arts and Sciences at Pace University’s highly regarded film program.
Revkin, who co-taught the course from 2010-2016, interviewed Co-producers and Media, Communications, and Visual Arts Professors Maria Luskay, EdD, and Lou Guarneri, MA, and three members of the student team, Samantha Buturla ’24 ’25, BA, English, Writing, and Rhetoric/MA, Communications and Digital Media, Katelyn Brennan ’25, BA, Communications, and Angie Starn ’24 ’25, BS, Digital Cinema and Filmmaking/MA, Communications and Digital Media, about various aspects of their filmmaking experiences.
Viola da Terra, which premiered both at the Jacob Burns Film Center in Pleasantville and in Terceira, Portugal, was filmed over spring break on Portugal’s Azorean islands of São Miguel and Terceira, and explores the story of the Viola da Terra, a traditional 12–15 string instrument with deep roots in Azorean identity, music, and cultural preservation.
The Producing the Documentary course requires students to complete a full-length documentary within 14 weeks. During the process, students learn teamwork, problem-solving, research, and organization, along with technical skills such as lighting, sound, camera work, interviewing, and other real-life lessons necessary to complete a film.
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