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Bay City Love: Stories and Songs of Inner-City Street Singers (BCL) is a documentary showcasing six African-American street-corner gospel singers. Through their individual stories, mixed with soulful acappella harmonies, we get insights into street artists, how homelessness affects them; and why their music touches us.

BACKGROUND There are two main issues that provide the background for this film – homelessness and street performers. The issue of homelessness is a problem in the largest urban areas of our country, and it is also a big issue in San Francisco. We will hear from those with a political and social overview of the city, such as former Mayor Willie Brown, Brown’s Head of the Office of Homelessness, and our current Mayor Gavin Newsom -- they all make a distinction between panhandlers and those who share their art for tips, thus deserving our respect. Each of the singers has views on these topics and their perspective is also of interest. The viewer will get to see beyond the politicians’ view. We’re not talking solutions here, but we will be getting eye-and-ear close to those who are living where the problems exist. That makes for a stimulating and uplifting subject. it will not only bring us close to these performers, we’ll be singing along with their music.

THE DOCUMENTARY Gavin Newsom, Mayor of San Francisco, starts this one-hour documentary by looking into the camera and telling us, “Everyone has the right to panhandle, but the public’s frustration should not be with those who are outside entertaining, doing so in a respectful manner. Those people, those individuals, those human beings -- they have the right to do that, and we should embrace that as a society.” As we listen to the Mayor, we also see panhandlers approaching tourists and waiting on corners for people to walk by and give them some money. The personal thoughts of the members of BCL are interspersed with footage of their life in the Tenderloin’s residential hotels and shelters, and this will help us understand these people on a personal level -- people of worth whom we can rarely or never get close to. We listen to Larry Glenn, Bosco Coleman, and Alex White , three of the group, singing outside the American Conservatory Theater (A.C.T.) on Geary Street before a matinee. Larry leads with “I’ve Got Trouble/Gotta cry sometime./ Lay awake at night,/ I know my Jesus will fix it, after awhile,” and we don’t have to imagine what these words really mean as we see various shots of the homeless population on the streets of San Francisco. A familiar Doo Whop song, “The Duke of Earl” gives Rick Clark the lead as Dan Hall, Larry Glenn, and Alex White harmonize this 50s favorite. We see some people pass by as if they don’t hear anything, some give them a glance, some snap a picture. and others stop to listen and applaud. Earl Gadsden then gives the background of how the group formed in l996 as a duet. Then six-foot-two, partially toothless, blind-in-one-eye bass singer, Alex White talks about his joining in that year. He explains that he sincerely believes that his singing with the group is a form of street ministry. And they join together, putting one hand on one another’s, heads bowed while Earl says a prayer before they begin, and we see that this street ministry is true for the whole group. As they sing, “Jesus is on the main line, tell Him what you want,” we get reactions from people passing whose spirits are obviously lifted by what they hear. “Somebody touched me.” is another crowd pleaser, and Alex shines when he sings, "Glory, glory glory, It must have been the hand of the Lord./ He turned my whole life around,/Placed my feet on solid ground./ Jesus touched me.” Rick then makes this a medley as he sings the lead: “Come on, come on, come on, don’t you want to go?/ We’re on that Heaven-bound journey./ Jesus wants you to go/. And I’m singing, yes, yes, I want to go.“ As Rick, Larry, and Alex, sit in the Jack-in-the-Box across the street from their singing spot, they talk about how they do their singing, who does what part and how it comes together; and then we hear them sing “This Little Light of Mine.” We get finger-close as they clap in unison. Boscoe Coleman confesses how musically illiterate he is, in the academic sense. yet he tells a very heartwarming story of the time when a teacher from City College approached him (after hearing him sing with the group) and asked if he’d like to come to his class to learn theory and harmony. His struggle just to afford the books, to learn what those musical notes were on the page, and to perform in front of his more knowledgeable classmates were many of the difficulties he talked about. Their signature song, “Study War No More” always gets people singing. We see that even a young African-American woman cannot help but stop on her way to the theater to clap and slap her side in time to their singing, and she is so moved that she says for all to hear, “Very good. You guys are so good…. wow!” Other interviewees add to the mix of people in this doc. Jenny Michael, an ethnic arts specialist, categorizes all these types of street artists as “an odd sort of beggar,” and she makes us think about “reliability, respect and legitimacy” as attributes we attach to regular artists but may not think about when watching street performers whose lives may not be so stable. We see BCL singing on a stage at the California Academy of Sciences Museum for the Traditional Arts Program. One of their members doesn’t show and is a disappointment to the others (and to me as well), but the rest of the group sparkles under the lights, with microphones, and an enthusiastic and appreciative audience. After they sing the Doo Whop song “Bye Baby Bye ,“ they pick up their tips and go to a nearby steps to count their “earnings.” Pleased fans gather around smiling and agreeing with each other that BCL is terrific. They spell out their name and answer in chorus: B-A-Y , BAY, C-I-T-Y CITY. L-U-V Loves you, and then Earl closes out their set by saying: “Yes, Bay City Luv loves you. We try to show that love with the music that we bring. Your listening ear is a very good reason to sing. God bless you and thank you.”

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