After living in Austin for ten years, I came to understand how central Willie Nelson is to the counterculture that shaped the city. When Sony invited me to pitch a short documentary about the making of Last Leaf on the Tree, it felt like a natural extension of the music journalism work I had been doing there.

Rather than a traditional “making-of,” Rooted in Time explores the relationship between Willie and his son Micah, who produced the album.

Through Micah’s description of a hidden door behind his father’s mind, an outlaw fortress where love and acceptance allow them to face change and death with grace, the film follows the intimate process of making the record and how creating together helped them meet life’s inevitable transformations.