Woodstock’s 40th Anniversary and Taking Woodstock

home blog Woodstock’s 40th Anniversary and Taking Woodstock

August 26, 2009
Woodstock’s 40th Anniversary and Taking Woodstock

Woodstock Festival was “3 Days of Peace and Music” in August of 1969. The site and the weekend are now infamous as the center of the hippie movement in America. Some of the most famous musicians of the time showed up to the dairy farm in upstate New York to perform and have fun with fans.

Artists such as Santana, John Sebastian, Sweetwater, Grateful Dead, Janis Joplin, The Who (who performed a 25-song set), Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, and Jimi Hendrix flocked to the festival to make a statement about peace during wartime: the Vietnam War was still very prominent and the military draft was in the near future.

Through a series of events the festival was set up on a small dairy farm, and the owners expected no more then 45,000-50,000 attendees. Instead, over a half a million people showed up for the concerts. What began as a quest to bring good music and musicians together ended up being one of the biggest statements of peace this country has ever seen.

A documentary was made about Woodstock and was extremely well-received, winning the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 1970. There were also Woodstock-specific albums released, and the event is still widely referenced and promoted today.

There is a new film, directed by Ang Lee, based on the story of the venue for the concert. The movie, Taking Woodstock, follows the series of events led by Elliot Tiber, who volunteered his parents’ hotel and land to hold the concert and to allow the festival to take place. The film stars Comedy Central’s Demetri Martin along with a huge cast, includingLiev Schreiber, Imelda Staunton, Henry Goodman, Emile Hirsch, Paul Dano, and Eugene Levy.

Celebrate the 40th anniversary of Woodstock by seeing the movie and/or listening to some classic music!

Related posts: