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Woodstock

Written on: August 10th, 2009 by: in News

Today’s Sunday New York Times Book Review led with an article about a couple of books related to this year’s 40th anniversary of the Woodstock Festival, including The Road to Woodstock, by Michael Lang, one the organizers of the event. You can read lengthy excerpts here at the publisher’s website.

There’s a wealth of other Woodstock-related library material available through one of your Delaware public libraries, and the Delaware Library Catalog. One of the best ways to remind yourself of what you missed (especially if you were there) is the seminal documentary Woodstock: 3 days of peace and music– now in a 40th anniversary Director’s Cut version. Joel Makower’s Woodstock: the Oral History is also worth a look.

There was a sizeable 25th anniversary concert in 1994- You can read a story about it in the August 1994 issue of Billboard. My recollection of it was that there were many complaints of it being muddy, corporate, and selfishly hedonistic. At the time, I was at the free alternative 25th anniversary concert, because my wife and I had been in upstate NY for her grandmother’s funeral, and thought that we might as well attend- we thought better of it after tramping 5 miles in the mud through pitch dark back roads and winding up in a muddy field with the rain pouring down, no tent, listening to Arlo Guthrie! My Mother-in-law’s dog, which we were taking back home with us, was never quite the same after that evening. Just like the original event, however, everyone in attendance was friendly, helpful, and beautiful.