Woodstock 50 appears to be history.
Event funders Dentsu Aegis Network said April 29 that the three-day festival revival would not go on.
“Despite our tremendous investment of time, effort and commitment, we don’t believe the production of the festival can be executed as an event worthy of the Woodstock Brand name while also ensuring the health and safety of the artists, partners and attendees.
“As a result and after careful consideration, Dentsu Aegis Network’s Amplifi Live, a partner of Woodstock 50, has decided to cancel the festival. As difficult as it is, we believe this is the most prudent decision for all parties involved.”
The cancellation comes a week after the festival failed to put tickets on sale, as scheduled. Organizers apparently had not received a permit for the event at Watkins Glen International race track, which anticipated as many as 100,000 fans.
While the pullout of the main financier appears to doom the festival, it wasn’t clear that the event was 100 percent dead. Festival organizers told an upstate New York newspaper that the show would go on.
“Woodstock 50 vehemently denies the festival’s cancellation and legal remedy will (be) sought,” a statement from organizers said.
And then, on April 30, promoter Michael Lang (of the original Woodstock) said: “We are committed to ensuring that the 50th anniversary of Woodstock is marked with a festival deserving of its iconic name and place in American history and culture. Although our financial partner is withdrawing, we will of course be continuing with the planning of the festival and intend to bring on new partners. …
“The bottom line is, there is going to be a Woodstock 50th anniversary festival, as there must be, and it’s going to be a blast!”
Billboard reported that organizers contacted promoters Live Nation and AEG seeking financing in order to save the event, but “with time running out and infighting grinding festival production to a halt,” they passed.
Woodstock 50 was planned for Aug. 16-18 in Watkins Glen. Announced acts included Santana, Jay-Z, John Fogerty, Dead & Company, Miley Cyrus, David Crosby and the Killers.
It was to be multigenerational affair, with acts stretching across the decades — from the 1960s stars the Zombies and Robert Plant, to current alt rockers Courtney Barnett and Soccer Mommy.
Meanwhile, a massive “Woodstock 50” CD set is set for an early August release by Rhino.
Just as well this dies on the vine. Woodstock 50, any way you spin it would just be one more exploitation of something wonderful and once in a lifetime. There are so few living members of the original acts, I can’t see why THEY can’t just get together and do a celebration on their own, maybe someplace near the original site. The idea of making Woodstock 50 a multi-generational event seems wrong. Woodstock belongs to one generation and one generation only. It was the final, massive and monumental expression of the spirit of peace and love that was unique to the late sixties. Let subsequent generations create their own unique, generation-defining event……and good luck with THAT.
Wanna celebrate Woodstock? Go watch the movie, maybe the rerelease director’s cut or read a couple of the countless books written by the people who lived it or at least were around and old enough to appreciate it. There’s a documentary about Woodstock that was done in the late 80s or early 90s that can only be found on VHS. Find a copy of that. You’ll love it! Miley Cyrus? Was she even born yet? Was her mother even born yet? Previous attempts at anniversary Woodstocks were themselves nothing to celebrate.
If you really have that much reverence for Woodstock, take a trip to the site where it happened and go to the museum in Bethel that can’t call itself The Woodstock Museum because……well I don’t know why they can’t use the name Woodstock, but it probably has something to do with money. I’m sure it has something to do with money. Speaking of money. I haven’t heard anything about it, but I’d be surprised if the owners of the film don’t rerelease it for the 50th anniversary. It would be a good chance to recoup some of the loss from the original concert.
It was sacrilege to use the Woodstock name to sell a godawful lineup anyway, especially in a time when there is hardly a counter culture or a vibe of togetherness and unity.
Race Baker is so right. I’ve watched a couple films lately about Deadheads and what was going on at Grateful Dead concerts back when Capt. Trips was still around. The parking lots, those last bastions of peace and love, had become crime ridden jungles where burnouts would rob you and sell you bad dope and where Grateful Dead gestapo would prowl the grounds looking for venders who used anything the GD had rights to on their goods so they could grab them up.
Those who know the facts about Woodstock know that the Grateful Dead and the Who forced the original Woodstock promoters to open the bank on that weekend and pay them cash or they weren’t going on and out of fear that them not playing might turn half a million people ugly, they paid up. Woodstock was a wonderful thing, but it was the crowd that made it so.
Back in October 25, 2009, in San Francisco, Golden Gate Park, there was a 40th anniversary of Woodstock. The event was called West Fest and it was FREE. There was more than 40 bands, performers and Merry Pranksters that performed that day, honoring Jimi Hendrix. I can tell you now, that event was more in the spirit of Woodstock than this, so called 50th anniversary. It’s all about money This crowd was multi-generational, in 2009, I was 55 and my daughter, was 18. We and the crowd grooved together.
I sell antiques at a mall near Chicago and specialize in 60s posters. My favorite thing about it is talking with young people, 18-25 who do get what that spirit of peace and love was all about. It’s very encouraging to me to see that this spirit manifests itself in young people all these years later. I’ve always said and still maintain that the spirit or magic or whatever you want to call it, that was the Summer of Love was experienced in different places, at different times even back in the 60s when it was born.
I think it came to us in Chicago a little later than those in San Francisco. A member of the MC5 claims that it never came to Detroit. The Haight Ashbury went to hell long before Woodstock happened, but I think those people who went to Woodstock collectively carried that spirit or dream with them and I think it’s still alive in some who were there and in some who are just kids today.
I was at the gates of Woodstock at 12 noon, ticket in hand!
As someone who was actually there, I’d like to hear your opinion of how best to celebrate the 50th anniversary. How will you celebrate? You are a lucky soul. I’ve suggested reading one or some of the many books about Woodstock. I have about 25 books about Woodstock and one of my favorites is “Woodstock, The Summer of Our Lives” by Jack Curry. It focuses on a number of people who went there and were involved in somewhat minor and unheralded ways. I strongly recommend that book.
To catch my ride to Woodstock in August of ’69, I had to hitch-hike a bit less than twenty miles. I had a BAD day hitching and was late getting to my destination. I stood at the intersection of 9th & Bay in Ocean City NJ (the pre-arranged meeting point for several of us) all afternoon and well into the evening when it became obvious I had missed my connection. I was 16 years old. To say I was sad would be the understatement of the century.
Fast forward 25 years to August 1994. I was working my butt off to establish my custom motorcycle shop I had opened 4 years earlier. Taking a weekend off was out of the question. Once again, I was destined to miss the show. And once again, sadness was the order of the day. Then the reports starting trickling in. Terms like “Greedstock” and Cashstock” were floating around at every turn. I asked one of my customers who DID attend the show how it was. He had missed the ’69 concert due to a previous obligation to meet some interesting fellows in southeast Asia with Uncle Sam’s Misguided Children. Since he had nothing to compare it to, he said it wasn’t bad, but seemed like the money-changers had taken over the temple.
Fast forward ANOTHER 25 years … I saw the proposed list of acts for the “reunion concert” and grudgingly faced the fact that any attempt to relive that magical August weekend in 1969 was not going to happen. Not in any meaningful way at least. I never made it to the ’69 Concert, but I most definitely was a part of the Woodstock Generation during the Age Of Aquarius. The music of the 60’s provided the soundtrack for my youth and I will be forever grateful. I may have missed a couple days in a muddy field, but I sure didn’t miss being part of the times that would shape my life.