Film in German: Melt

In January 1961, the new president of the Congo, Patrice Lumumba, was assassinated with the complicity of Belgium and the United States in order to plunder the country’s wealth. Louis Armstrong was on tour in the Congo and unwittingly became a figurehead for the first post-colonial coup d’état in Africa, whilst other artists such as Nina Simone, Duke Ellington and Dizzy Gillespie questioned their position in their own country, where racial segregation was still in force. Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev denounces the United Nations’ complicity in Lumumba’s ousting (and subsequent assassination) at the General Assembly. Abbey Lincoln and Max Roach storm the UN building to protest.

With the energy and urgency of the time, Soundtrack to a Coup d’État is an indictment of colonial power, the scars of which still resonate today, inviting us to view the past as a lesson for the future.

As part of the Docu.emme programme.