Restoring Audio and Video of Rare Jeff Healey Band Concert Footage

Technicolor helped restore both the picture and audio in Eagle Rock’s recently released video of The Jeff Healey Band, Live in Belgium.  Performed in 1993 at the Peer Blues Festival in Belgium, while the band was on tour promoting their album Feel This, the concert features the original trio as well as a pair of backup vocalists and a keyboard player, and captures captivating performances of “Heart of an Angel”, “Roadhouse Blues”, “Angel Eyes”, and more. The concert footage also includes the band’s famous cover of George Harrison’s “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.”

Despite having been blind since childhood, Jeff Healey had developed a unique style of playing his guitar on his lap, and went on to become one of the most renowned singer, songwriter, and guitarists in Canada.  This original concert film may be among the only footage of Healey using a guitar rig that allowed him to stand up while performing his music.

In order to convert the original live concert footage, which was preserved on BCSP Pal, to HD, senior editors Ed Ham and Chris Mayo had to clean up digital imperfections, while Technicolor’s Design & VFX team, headed by Kevin Chandoo, had to digitally correct several shots that were damaged by tape folds and creases. Colin Moore then stepped in to take care of the final colour correction, thereby brining the 19-year-old images back to life in vivid detail.

As the footage also required restoration of the original audio, Sound Service Manager James Porteous resumed his familiar chair of re-recording engineer, and carefully converted the original 2-track stereo sound to a 5.1 surround mix. He was supported throughout the entire re-mixing process by Assistant Audio Engineers, Adam Raley and Paolo Amati, who were instrumental in providing technical assurance throughout the archival restoration of all the tracks featured on this unique, musical restoration project.