by Robert Wilkinson
53 years ago today on August 15, 1969, the Woodstock Music & Art Fair opened and changed countless lives forever. This party will last through Thursday!
We’ll begin this series of articles with the three days of the festival itself, and then when we’re done with the vibe as it was created then, I’ll post something to close that will provide some perspective about the months running up to the festival and the aftermath of what happened to our nation in the months after this event. It was a time when history itself was swirling with a new national promise for a better world despite the turmoil of the times.
Later on, this national “coming together” would be termed “Woodstock Nation.” But the half million who came together at Max Yasgur’s farm that August had no idea. It was just a bunch of people who came to see the best of the best over three days of love, mud, music, cooperation, and togetherness.
You can find more about the event and who played, or didn’t, and why, at this link from Wikipedia on Woodstock, as well as Woodstock wiki main page.
Today we'll post some of the first day's acts in order of performance. Tomorrow and Sunday we'll do the same. The show was opened by an invocation and benediction offered by the venerable Swami Satchidananda. We begin with Swami Satchidananda Keynote address at the Woodstock Music & Peace Festival
Since Richie Havens opened the musical part of the show, we begin this anniversary celebration with the final four tunes of his performance at Woodstock, beginning with “Handsome Johnny”
We’ll follow it with the video outtake of “With A Little Help From Our Friends”
Here’s another video outtake! ”Flying High Bird”
The clips of his performances of “Strawberry Fields Forever” and “Hey Jude” have disappeared, so here’s his album version of “Strawberry Fields Forever” and “Hey Jude”
According to legend, he ran out of songs to play, and so created an iconic tune on the spot! For your enjoyment, here’s Richie Havens performing “Freedom”
Here’s the audio to his entire 30 minute set! Richie Havens at Woodstock 1969 – entire set
Sweetwater was originally scheduled to open the festival, but they, like hundreds of thousands more, got stuck in traffic and were eventually airlifted in by chopper. This year I have five of their ten, some video, some audio. The entire audio set is at the end of this section.
Their opening number was ”Motherless Child”
They followed that with ”Look Out”” and ”For Pete’s Sake”
Here's a short video of their next song ”What’s Wrong” and a longer video of ”Crystal Spider” (sounds like they and the Jefferson Airplane had a similar sound).
Here’s the audio to their entire 45 minute set! Sweetwater at Woodstock 1969 – entire set
Because this performance was around the time of Woodstock, I'll include it here to give you a sense of this eclectic SoCal band which soared high and crashed in tragedy! Live on The Hollywood Palace tv show hosted that night by Bing Crosby, here's Sweetwater groovin' on the one with their hit "Motherless Child."
We follow West Coast psychedelia with the great "forgotten" Woodstock performer who went on next. Bert Sommer, formerly of The Left Banke, came on and gave us this great performance of "Jennifer."
Bert doing the Paul Simon classic "America”
He ended his set with the upbeat "Smile”
Here’s the audio to his entire 40 minute set! Bert Sommer at Woodstock 1969 – entire set
Bert was followed by the legendary Tim Hardin performing his signature tune “If I Were A Carpenter”
Here’s Tim’s audio-only performance that day of “Hang On To A Dream”
Here’s a great clip to most of his set! Tim Hardin at Woodstock (“Reason to Believe,” “How Can We Hang On To A Dream,” “Simple Song of Freedom,” “Blues on my Ceiling,” “Misty Roses,” “Snow White Lady”)
Though this isn’t his Woodstock performance, it’s still Tim live in 1968 playing a song that also made the set list at Woodstock. Here’s the beautiful “Reason To Believe”
Though I just gave you his Woodstock performance of this song, it’s a beautiful and timeless tune, so I’ll give you the studio version here. For one of the greatest antiwar tunes ever to be given to our world, written by the great Bobby Darin that became a hit for Tim, here’s the timeless “Simple Song of Freedom”
Ravi Shankar then took the stage! We begin with a great 4 minute video of Ravi performing “Evening Raga"
Here’s a 21 minute raga for your meditative enjoyment, "Raga Majh Khamaj"
Here’s the audio to his entire 54 minute set! Ravi Shankar at Woodstock 1969 – entire set
Melanie followed Ravi, and performed 7 songs. The first three are the audio versions, and the last three are videos of her performing.
A great video of her performing ”Mister Tambournine Man” and “Tuning My Guita,.” and we’ll finish with the closer ”Birthday of the Sun.”
Here’s the audio to her entire 21 minute set! Melanie at Woodstock 1969 – entire set
We now present my favorite performer on that first day! In the spirit of Arlo’s head space, here’s his opening number, an iconic ode to green power! “Comin’ In to Los Angeles” (this video has numerous links on the right side said to be “lost performances” of bands at Woodstock that didn’t make the final cut for the theaters. Some of them are actually from the movie, while others aren’t. Take a look if you haven’t had enough by the end of today’s feature!)
Here’s his performance of the Bob Dylan tune “Walkin’ Down the Line” (This year’s clip includes Arlo’s stoned rap about the event closing the NY State Turnpike along with “Lotta freaks.”)
Here’s the audio to his entire 33 minute set! Arlo Guthrie at Woodstock 1969 – entire set
Closing that first day, the great Joan Baez with Jeffrey Shurtleff performing “One Day At A Time.” We'll finish this first day celebration with her performance of “Joe Hill”
Here’s a link to her entire 12 song set. Some are videos, others are audio. The last three clips have nothing to do with Woodstock. The last clip is a live Velvet Underground show. How very strange….. Joan Baez at Woodstock 1969 – entire set
Some years back I had the entire 2 hour 17 minute audio-only movie soundtrack, as well as long videos of some performances, but this year there’s nothing out there I feel is suitable. So at this point, we’ll close our Sunday Woodstock show.
See you tomorrow with part of the lineup of August 16, 1969, featuring Santana, CCR, Janis, and the Who!
Woodstock Nation was always a state of mind.....
© Copyright 2022 Robert Wilkinson
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