By Carol Fisher-Linn
Who remembers Woodstock? Or 10,000 Maniacs at Griffis Sculpture Park?
It’s outdoor concert season: tunes, booze, and patchouli
I missed Woodstock. Halfway through my third pregnancy, I watched the event unfold on television. 1969 was a summer of music festivals held all over the globe, some not very peaceful – but in August, fifty-three years ago, the draw of a rock festival in NYS was “3 Days of Peace and Music.” In the end, the organizers delivered on their promise, but they had to get through unexpected masses of attendees, (planned: 80,000/actual turnout: close to half million), snarled traffic and abandoned cars on the highways and country roads leading to the Max Yasgur farm in Bethel, NY. Being denied by the town board in Woodstock on short notice, they rented Max’s 600-acre farm. Bethel was near enough to Woodstock to keep the festival name (posters citing Woodstock were already printed). The 4 organizers, Woodstock Ventures, lost their shirts – 50,000 to 80,000 tickets were expected to be sold, but, in the end, the massive influx of people and no fences, gave them no choice but to make it a free event. Imagine being one of the people who had bought $6 tickets and hold them as souvenirs today!
Untamed as the whole show was it was also an opportunity to gather more of the world’s greatest rock artists in one environment – 32 acts – than ever before. Picture open-air sleeping wherever a patch of ground was available, never mind the porta-potty queues (600 – 1 for every 800 people), the shortage of food offset by an unlimited supply of drugs, (some police were present but apparently adopted a “no harm-no foul” attitude), walls of exposed skin with nudes covered knee-deep in mud, skinny-dipping in the farm pond, and … did I mention the rain? Mud-sliding was another form of entertainment. With plenty of hugging, love was in the air, along with the whiffs of patchouli and marijuana, which was willingly shared with friends and strangers. Asking for first-hand stories about Woodstock netted me one person, my husband, Dennis Linn. At 21, he and a few college friends heard about this concert and decided that at less than 4 hours, it was close enough to be worth the drive. He remembers the mud, no sleep or decent food, no cold – or any – beer after the first day, great music – they stayed for Hendrix, strangers offering marijuana and willingly sharing front-row spots. Asked if he witnessed any fights, he laughed. “No,” says he, “this was the peace and love generation just having a good time.”
This came from societyofrock.com – “Was it a sign of things to come? Yes, but it was on a positive note. A bunch of hippies descending into town may sound like a recipe for disaster but on the contrary, more than 500,000 who were present in Woodstock made history. They were having so much fun that nothing could ever dampen their spirits.”
Now, closer to home 22 years later, an outdoor concert that this writer did attend took place at Griffis Sculpture Park (see cover story) in July 1991. Three to four hundred people were expected – about 5,000 showed up … following a torrential rainstorm the night before. The rain was so bad that the company that was to supply the sound equipment thought they had cancelled and didn’t show up. Thankfully, as luck would have it, it was a Sunday so a quick scramble to nearby Ellicottville bars produced equipment that the night before would not have been available. I remember a long climb up a muddy hill carrying a blanket and snacks, surrounded by throngs of happy people looking forward to hearing 10,000 Maniacs (with Natalie Merchant), John and Mary, and The Outer Circle Orchestra. Since they were delayed getting their sound system together, I remember the members of The Outer Circle Orchestra dancing in the grass and weaving their way around the blankets, playing their music as they strolled about. Perhaps it was the bohemian art environment, but much like Woodstock, it was an uneventful event as far as disruptive episodes. Were you there?
Don’t miss their 9th annual summer festival on Sunday, August 21, 2022 from 1-6pm. It’s a day filled with music, creativity, exploration and much more. Check out their website for more information – www.griffispark.org.