Deep Roots: The Art and Music of Bill Steber and Friends (2025)

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DEEP ROOTS: The Art and Music of Bill Steber and Friends is the latest feature-length music film directed by Robert Mugge, and produced by Mugge with his partner Diana Zelman. It is intended as a companion piece to Mugge’s 1991 film DEEP BLUES, which explored blues traditions of the Mississippi Delta and North Mississippi Hill Country. DEEP ROOTS examines the life and work of artist, photographer, and musician Bill Steber, while showcasing Black and white musical traditions of the nineteen-twenties and nineteen-thirties, and rural music scenes of Mississippi and Tennessee. The film's first half takes place in Steber’s home base of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, and its second half in the Mississippi Delta, long a major focus of his work. Included are interviews conducted at a Murfreesboro gallery exhibit of Steber’s art and photography; visits to Clarksdale, Mississippi’s Juke Joint Festival and Leland, Mississippi’s Highway 61 Blues Museum; and public performances by three of Steber’s powerful music groups: Jake Leg Stompers, Stoop Down Rounders, and Hoodoo Men.