Movies - Woodstock Festival

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The Woodstock Music and Art Festival was the most famous rock festival of its era. It was held at Max Yasgur's 600 acre (2.4 km²) dairy farm in Bethel, New York on August 15-17, 1969. The Woodstock Festival represented the culmination of the counterculture of the 1960s and the ultimate climax of the "hippie era". Many of the best-known musicians of the times appeared during the rain-plagued weekend, much of which was captured in a successful 1970 movie, Woodstock
. Joni Mitchell's song Woodstock encapsulated the event and became a major hit.

The festival

The festival bears the name "Woodstock" because it was originally scheduled to take place in the town of Woodstock, in Ulster County, but the town offered no appropriate site to host such a large event. A site was found in the town of Wallkill; local opposition arose, however, and the event was almost cancelled altogether. But Sam Yasgur persuaded his father Max to allow the concert to be held on the family's property, located in Sullivan County, which lies about 40 miles southwest of Woodstock itself.

Although the show had been planned for a maximum 50,000 attendees, over 500,000 eventually attended, most of whom did not pay admission. The highways leading to the concert were jammed with traffic and people as they abandoned their cars and walked for miles to the concert area. The weekend was rainy, facilities were overcrowded, and attendees shared food, alcoholic beverages, and drugs. Local residents of this modest tourist-oriented area gave blankets and food to some concertgoers. However, no violence was reported and the fact that attendees were remarkably well behaved was particularly noted.

The festival did not initially make money for the promoters, although, thanks to record sales and proceeds from the highly regarded film of the event, it did eventually become profitable.

There were three deaths at Woodstock: one from a heroin overdose, one from a ruptured appendix, and one from being run over by a tractor. Two unconfirmed births reportedly occurred at Woodstock.

Arguably the stars of Woodstock were The Who and Jimi Hendrix. Due to arguments with the promoters about their pay, The Who didn't take stage until about 4:00 in the morning. The highlight of The Who's peformance was "See Me, Feel Me", when the sun rose just as lead singer Roger Daltrey began to sing the chorus. After their set, the band's leader, Pete Townshend, began smashing his guitar and ultimately threw it into the crowd. This moment helped establish The Who as superstars and helped their album Tommy sell multi-platinum. Along with The Who, Jimi Hendrix also had a big impact with his performance, including a distorted version of "The Star Spangled Banner" . The song was somewhat controversial, as the Vietnam War was underway. These two performances are held by fans as some of the greatest in rock history, though both The Who and Hendrix regarded their performances as sub-par.

The promoters of the original Woodstock were Michael Lang, Artie Kornfield, John Roberts, and Joel Rosenman. Roberts was the money man, with a trust fund bankroll; his friend Rosenman, a graduate of Yale Law, was a lounge guitarist. Their associates were Kornfield, a vice-president at Capitol Records, fond of drugs and well-connected, and Michael Lang. An unlikely businessman, Lang was a light-hearted hippie who had owned a head shop, and hoped to eventually build a recording studio in the Woodstock area to serve artists such as Bob Dylan and Janis Joplin, who had homes nearby. When Lang and Kornfield presented the idea to Rosenman and Roberts, Rosenman hatched the idea of a rock concert instead of a studio with the same performing artists. After toying with an Age of Aquarius theme, they settled on the slogan "Three Days of Peace and Music", partly as a way to placate suspicious local officials, and partly to appeal to anti-war sentiment. They hired commercial artist Arnold Skolnick to design the artwork, which incorporated a catbird design Skolnick had in his notebooks.

Lang would go on to produce successor concerts in 1994 and 1999, although he had nothing to do with the Woodstock-named concerts of 1979 and 1989.

In 1997, the site of the concert and 1,400 surrounding acres was purchased by Alan Gerry for future developement as Performing Arts Center under the Gerry Foundation. In 2000 the Gerry Foundation annouced that the original 38 acres of the Woodstock site was to be preserved, though in 2002, there may be development plans on the original site .

Performing artists and sequence of events

Friday, August 15

The day officially began just after 5 p.m. with Richie Havens, and featured many mellow sets showcasing most of the event's folk artists.

Richie Havens, opening with his twelve-string guitar and "High Flyin' Bird"
Country Joe McDonald, five-song set including "Janis" and "I-Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-to-Die Rag"
John Sebastian, not originally scheduled but found wandering around the massive crowd and agreed to play a set.
Incredible String Band: "Catty Come", "This Moment Is Different", and "When You Find Out Who You Are"
Sweetwater, including "Motherless Child", "What's Wrong", and "Why Oh Why"
Bert Sommer, including "Jennifer", "She's Gone", "Things Are Going My Way", and "Smile"
Tim Hardin, "If I Were A Carpenter"
Ravi Shankar, with a 5-song set, but he had to quit due to rain
Melanie, "Beautiful People" and "Birthday of the Sun"
Arlo Guthrie, "Coming Into Los Angeles", "Walking Down The Line", and "Amazing Grace"
Joan Baez, ending a 5-song set with "We Shall Overcome"

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Woodstock Festival ]

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Movies - Woodstock Festival

The festival

Performing artists and sequence of events

Friday, August 15

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