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Back to the garden
A scrapbook of memories about 'three days of peace and music'
Concert-goers sit on the roof of a Volkswagen bus at the Woodstock Music and Art Fair in 1969 at Bethel, N.Y. Associated Press file
By JAMES D. WATTS JR. World Scene Writer
Published: 7/5/2009 2:23 AM
Last Modified: 7/5/2009 4:16 AM
It shouldn't come as too much of a surprise that the idea that became Woodstock began as a marijuana-fueled dream.
"What if we had all the money in the world — we could rent a Broadway theater, have a concert and just invite our friends," Artie Kornfeld recalled. "We could get Jimi Hendrix, the Rolling Stones, Creedence Clearwater, Sly Stone, the Beatles, and every other act that (we) would love to see perform. We wouldn't charge anything, and it will be one of the greatest parties of all time."
Kornfeld, who was working for Capitol Records at the time, thought this dream would always remain a dream — until he and the friend he shared that dream with, Michael Lang, happened to come across an ad placed by John Roberts and Joel Rosenman, two well-to-do young men looking for a way to use what they described as "unlimited capital."
About $2.4 million of that capital went into the creation of a three-day event, held August 15-17, 1969, on several acres of a dairy farm run by a man named Max Yasgur near Woodstock, N.Y., a small town about two hours west of New York City.
The promoters told everyone they were expecting maybe 50,000 people to attend — a conservative figure to placate the locals, even though the promoters knew that the event was going to attract a crowd of at least 150,000 thousand.
That original dream came true in a lot of ways. The Beatles and the Stones weren't on the bill, but the other artists — plus such performers as Crosby, Stills & Nash, Joe Cocker, the Who, Jefferson Airplane, Santana and Arlo Guthrie — made the gig.
It didn't start out as a free show — tickets were $7 per day, or $18 for the whole weekend — but it became one when the presenters forgot to set up ticket booths and the hordes of people descending on the concert site tore down the fences around the farm's perimeter. "There was no malice," one concert-goer said later. The fence in question "was just meant to be down."
And it certainly became one of the greatest gatherings, if not parties, of all time: as many as 500,000 people, most of them under the age of 30, living together in relative peace for three days.
This year marks the 40th anniversary of the "Woodstock Music and Art Fair: An Aquarian Exposition," to use its full official title. The art fair and the exposition, like the ticket booths, security, sanitation facilities and concessions, never materialized.
The music certainly happened, with some performers putting on shows that are among the most iconic moments in rock music history - Crosby, Stills & Nash performing for only the second time; Joe Cocker's volcanic "With a Little Help from My Friends"; and Jimi Hendrix's deconstruction of "The Star-Spangled Banner."
But, for most of the people interviewed for "Woodstock: Peace, Music, Memories," the importance of Woodstock was not the performances, but the simple fact that it happened.
WOODSTOCK: Peace, music, memories
By Brad Littleproud and Joanne Hague
(Krause Publications, $24.95)
In ‘Stock’
By the time we get to Woodstock,
we may be drowning in
40th anniversary retrospectives
and reissues. Of course, that
doesn’t mean that some of them
aren’t worthwhile.
The product avalanche began
Tuesday, when Sony Legacy
unleashed “The Woodstock Experience”
— a 10-CD boxed set that
focuses on the performances of
Santana, Janis Joplin, Sly and the
Family Stone, Johnny Winter and
Jefferson Airplane and includes
25 previously unreleased tracks
and six posters.
Rhino has already rolled out
remastered versions of “Music
From the Original Soundtrack and
More: Woodstock” and “Woodstock
Two” to coincide with the
re-release of the “Woodstock”
documentary on Warner Home
Video.
But the big prize will come from
Rhino Aug. 18 with “Woodstock
— 40 Years On: Back to Yasgur’s
Farm.” The six-CD boxed set will
sequence the 77 songs in the
order they were played at the
festival, including 38 previously
unreleased tracks, as well as a
few firsts — the entire set list
of the festival in the liner notes
and Max Yasgur’s entire address
to the crowd — as well as stage
announcements and, fittingly, the
sound of rain.
Newsday
James D. Watts Jr. 581-8478
james.watts@tulsaworld.com
By JAMES D. WATTS JR. World Scene Writer
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