A Soulful Duet in ‘Sweet Old Song’

The creation of music and art might well serve to keep nonagenarian Howard “Louie Bluie” Armstrong’s body and mind sharp, but his love for and from life partner Barbara Ward tends his soul.

“Sweet Old Song,” which airs at 10 tonight on KCET, explores their collaboration in life and art. A bit uneven, the “P.O.V.” film doesn’t clearly demonstrate on which path the director means to take the audience, and the chronology of Armstrong’s life and career before Ward entered his life isn’t really clear. But like Armstrong, it is held together by Ward.

With seemingly disparate threads of music, art and love, she acts as a seamstress weaving this patchwork quilt of history, each panel representing different aspects of his life--family, the Old South, history, romance and the reality of aging.

Armstrong, recognized as a national treasure by the National Endowment for the Arts in 1990, is celebrated by jazz and blues aficionados for his exuberant style. He breathes creativity, composing poetry, drawing effortlessly and sawing on his fiddle with the same skill as he did as a youth. Proficient in 22 instruments, he is the lone survivor of the black string band genre that flourished before World War II. His repertoire is a blend of swing, blues, country and spirituals that these traveling bands played.

In helping Armstrong to keep memories alive by drawing on the past, literally and figuratively, Ward encourages him to return to LaFollette, Tenn., his childhood hometown. The journey brings memories both bitter (his brother’s death and pervasive racial discrimination) and sweet (the embrace of the community and his enduring love of family).