So yesterday, when I wrote that the first time Crosby, Stills and Nash & Young played together was at Woodstock. Well on today’s date 45 years ago – seems not that long ago in some ways and in others it is literally a lifetime ago. In looking over the schedule of the performances CSN&Y were not scheduled to perform until Monday the 18th at 3:00 am! The acts that were scheduled for the 15th were:
Richie Havens – who opened the festival! Following the opening speech and invocation by Swami Satchidananda the following acts played on the 15th and into the morning of the 16th….
Sweetwater
Bert Sommer
Tim Hardin – watch Tim perform “If I were a Carpenter – here
Ravi Shankar
Melanie
Arlo Guthrie
Joan Baez
According to Wikipedia Ravi Shankar played through the rain and Joan Baez was six months pregnant at the time. Here’s some more about the festival from Wiikipedia:
The Woodstock Music & Art Fair—informally, the Woodstock Festival or simply Woodstock—was a music festival, billed as “An Aquarian Exposition: 3 Days of Peace & Music”. It was held at Max Yasgur’s 600-acre (240 ha; 0.94 sq mi) dairy farm in the Catskills near the hamlet of White Lake in the town of Bethel, New York, from August 15 to 18, 1969. Bethel, in Sullivan County, is 43 miles (69 km) southwest of the town of Woodstock, New York, in adjoining Ulster County.
During the sometimes rainy weekend, 32 acts performed outdoors before an audience of 400,000 young people.[2] It is widely regarded as a pivotal moment in popular music history. Rolling Stone listed it as one of the 50 Moments That Changed the History of Rock and Roll.[3]
The festival is also widely considered to be the definitive nexus for the larger counterculture generation.[4][5]
The event was captured in the 1970 documentary movie Woodstock, an accompanying soundtrack album, and Joni Mitchell’s song “Woodstock”, which commemorated the event and became a major hit for Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Read More
A little while ago I came across this video of Joni Mitchell performing “Woodstock” and describing how she didn’t get to go to the festival… me neither!! How about you???
