On August 15, 1969, what
was meant to be just “3 Days of Peace & Music” at Max Yasgur’s
dairy farm in Bethel, NY, unfolded into something much bigger. Nearly
half a million people showed up, through rain, mud, delays—and the music
didn’t stop.
Here’s the complete lineup by day
Friday & Saturday (Aug 15–16):
Richie
Havens, Swami Satchidananda (opening invocation), Sweetwater, Bert
Sommer, Tim Hardin, Ravi Shankar, Melanie, Arlo Guthrie, Joan Baez,
Quill, Country Joe McDonald, Santana, John Sebastian (unscheduled), Keef
Hartley Band, The Incredible String Band, Canned Heat, Mountain,
Grateful Dead, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Janis Joplin & the
Kozmic Blues Band, Sly & the Family Stone, The Who, Jefferson
Airplane.
Sunday & Monday morning (Aug 17–18):
Joe
Cocker & the Grease Band, Country Joe & the Fish, Ten Years
After, The Band, Johnny Winter, Blood, Sweat & Tears, Crosby,
Stills, Nash & Young, Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Sha Na Na, Jimi
Hendrix (closing act Monday morning).
What a historic roll call.
Its full name was The Woodstock Music and Art
Fair, its message was peace and love.
On the third day of the festival, just before Joe Cocker's early afternoon set, Max Yasgur, the humble farmer who lent his land for the occasion addressed the crowd:
"I'm a farmer. I don't know how to speak to twenty people at one time, let alone a crowd like this. But I think you people have proven something to the world — not only to the Town of Bethel, or Sullivan County, or New York State; you've proven something to the world. This is the largest group of people ever assembled in one place. We have had no idea that there would be this size group, and because of that you've had quite a few inconveniences as far as water, food, and so forth. Your producers have done a mammoth job to see that you're taken care of... they'd enjoy a vote of thanks. But above that, the important thing that you've proven to the world is that a half a million kids — and I call you kids because I have children that are older than you are — a half million young people can get together and have three days of fun and music and have nothing but fun and music, and I – God bless you for it!"
... Max
Yasgur, said this
on stage the last day of Woodstock as America was sending Kids to
Vietnam to die.
Martin Scorsese down in front inside the fence returning the peace sign to Max.
August 15, 1969, Richie Havens opens the Woodstock Festival.
The Woodstock festival had been scheduled to begin on Friday afternoon. Sweetwater was the planned first act. The audience had been streaming onto the festival site for days, in numbers far exceeding expectations, and traffic had already clogged all roads leading to the festival for dozens of miles. Sweetwater and their equipment were stuck in Liberty, normally a 20-minute drive away, but now accessible only by helicopter. Richie and his bandmates, Deano Williams and Daniel Ben Zebulon, had been flown to the festival site in a small helicopter that landed behind the stage. Tim Hardin was also on-site, along with a few other performers. As the start time came and went, Michael Lang pleaded with Hardin to take the stage and open the festival. Hardin adamantly refused, reminding Lang that he was supposed to go on fifth. Lang appealed to Richie, who finally, reluctantly agreed, telling the festival promoter that he would owe him big-time if anyone threw any bottles at him. Richie’s bass player, Eric Oxendine, was still stuck in traffic, but Richie agreed to perform without him.
At approximately 5:15 on Friday afternoon, Richie, Deano, and Daniel walked onto the still unfinished stage, sat down, and began to play their 20-minute set. They opened with “From the Prison” from Richie’s Something Else Again album, with a bit of the Youngbloods’ “Get Together” thrown in for good measure. He followed with “I’m a Stranger Here,” which was one of the demos he recorded before signing with Verve Folkways. He concluded his set with two songs from his debut album, “High Flyin’ Bird” and “I Can’t Make It Anymore.” Still with no act ready to follow Richie, Michael Lang convinced him to do an encore. Richie attempted to play “With a Little Help from My Friends,” the Beatles cover from his newly released 1983 album.
He obviously had trouble remembering the lyrics, so he asked the audience to sing along. Later in the festival, Joe Cocker would also perform the song, creating one of the most memorable moments of Woodstock. Richie then redeemed himself with a second encore, a performance of “Handsome Johnny” from Mixed Bag. He returned for a third encore at Michael Lang’s insistence, a medley of the Beatles’ “Strawberry Fields Forever” from his 1983 album and “Hey Jude.”
Finally, exhausted and at a loss to remember any additional songs, Richie Havens began playing a guitar groove. The word “freedom” came to his mind, and he began singing. He added a few lines from the traditional song, “Motherless Child,” and a new song, an anthem for the Woodstock festival, was created live on stage. The song, "Freedom" was immortalized in the Oscar-winning 1970 documentary film, Woodstock, and the film’s soundtrack album and became a staple of Richie’s performances the rest of his career. Richie told the story many times about having to go to the theater and watch the movie to learn the song he had extemporaneously written on the Woodstock stage. Woodstock was a defining moment for Richie Havens, and he would reference his performance at the festival for the rest of his career.
Guitarist Paul “Deano” Williams accompanied Richie throughout his career, also contributing to a 2000 Pete Farrow album. Daniel Ben Zebulon is still active as a musician and has played percussion with Andy Gibb, Stevie Wonder, Dionne Warwick, and the Bee Gees. Over his career, Richie Havens released 24 albums, including the well-received Stonehenge (1970), The Great Blind Degree (1971), and Alarm Clock (1971) on his own label and a number of albums on various labels. He would release his final album, Nobody Left to Crown, in 2008. He was a tireless live performer who thrived on personal contact with his fans. In addition to his music, Richie Havens devoted his life to educating young people about ecological issues. He co-founded the Northwind Undersea Institute, an oceanographic children’s museum in the Bronx, and helped create The Natural Guard, an organization described as “a way of helping kids learn that they can have a hands-on role in affecting the environment.” Havens died on April 22, 2013, at the age of 72, and his ashes were spread on the site of his beloved Woodstock festival, here at Bethel Woods, at a memorial service attended by many of his friends, family, and fans.
Woodstock Master of Ceremonies Chip Monck
In 1969 he lit the concert that would define his career and make him a public figure. Monck was hired to plan and build the staging and lighting for the Woodstock Music & Art Fair's "Aquarian Exposition" music festival. Paid $7,000 for ten weeks of work, much of his plan had to be scrapped when the promoters were not allowed to use the original location in Wallkill, New York. The stage roof that was constructed in the shorter time available was not able to support the lighting that had been rented, which wound up sitting unused underneath the stage. The only light on the stage was from spotlights.
Just before the concert started, Monck was drafted as the master of ceremonies when Michael Lang noticed that they had forgotten to hire one. He can be heard (and seen) in recordings of Woodstock making the stage announcements, including requests to "stay off the towers" and the warning about the "brown acid".
“To get back to the warning that I’ve received, you might take it with however many grains of salt you wish, that the brown acid that is circulating around us is not specifically too good. It's suggested that you do stay away from that. Of course it’s your own trip, so be my guest. But please be advised that there’s a warning on that one, okay?” ~ Chip Monck
What happened once the last note was played?
When Jimi Hendrix finished his set on Monday morning, the crowd was a fraction of its former size. Exhausted and dirty, attendees slowly began to leave. The festival grounds were a wreck—littered with trash, clothing, tents, and broken equipment.
Clean-up took weeks. Farmers complained about ruined fields, and the organizers faced lawsuits and debt. Some said the event was an environmental disaster. But those who had been there knew they had experienced something unforgettable.
The town of Bethel tried to move on. It wasn’t until years later that Woodstock was truly embraced as a cultural milestone. In time, the site was preserved and turned into a historic park and museum to honor the festival's legacy.
Though the fields eventually emptied, the spirit of Woodstock lived on. It lingered in the memories of those who were there—and echoed through the generations that followed.
Why does Woodstock still matter more than 50 years later?
Woodstock didn’t just define a weekend—it defined a generation. Over 50 years later, it remains a cultural reference point, not only for music festivals but for youth activism, idealism, and peaceful resistance. It showed the power of gathering, of people coming together with shared values and making something greater than themselves.
Since 1969, many festivals have tried to recapture its spirit—some succeeding more than others. Woodstock ‘94 and Woodstock ‘99 attempted to honor the original, but only ‘94 captured a fraction of the original peace-loving energy. The violence and commercialism of ‘99 served as a harsh reminder that Woodstock couldn’t be recreated—it was a unique moment in time.
The myth of Woodstock has grown: it’s been immortalized in documentaries, books, songs, and academic studies. Critics argue that the reality was messier than the nostalgia suggests—there were overdoses, logistical failures, and muddy misery. But even those who were there often describe it as life-changing, a moment when they felt the world might actually shift toward peace and compassion.
Woodstock
1969 is remembered not because it was perfect, but because it was real.
It captured the heart of a generation seeking truth, unity, and freedom
through the raw power of sound.
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