the great festivals 69-70

The most documented American music festival came of course in 1969 with Woodstock, but it was the months that preceded and followed that which defined the era of the great festivals. Woodstock was the show stealer simply by the media getting to notice what this new phenomena was or could be, until then music festivals were smaller and mainly attended by music fans who focused on a particular genre. Folk, Jazz etc. Now this new rise in attendance was a young audience who maybe had come from all parts of the country regardless of just one style of music but a shared sense of a place to demonstrate their united belief in what the music had now come to represent, whether it was political, social or artistic. It was clear this was an entirely different spectacle to anything gone before.

The Newport festival in 1969 really became the blueprint for what was to follow in just over a year. Indeed Newport has always been some what over looked. In 1968 it was the first music concert to have more than 100,000. The following year in June it ran to 150,000. The list of performers was impressive.
Friday June 20th : Albert King, the Jimi Hendrix Experience, Joe Cocker, Spirit and Taj Mahal.
Saturday, June 21, 1969 : Albert Collins, Buffy St. Marie, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Eric Burdon, Jethro Tull, Love, Steppenwolf.
Sunday, June 22, 1969 : Booker T & the MG's, Chambers Brothers, the Flock, Johnny Winter, Marvin Gaye, Buddy Miles, Eric Burdon, the Byrds, the Rascals
There were more added on all days.
It was in someways a dress rehearsal for what was to come at Woodstock a month later.

By the following year such was the popularity of these massive festivals the Atlanta Festival held in Georgia had an estimated 350,000 to 500,000 people attend which was larger than Woodstock had recorded at the time (these figures have changed over the years, and always get larger).
The Atlanta lineup was similar to Newport and Woodstock, and just as impressive with the addtion of one or two more performers.
By now the hallmark of a 'great' festival was to have Jimi Hendrix appear, such was his relevance to the growth of these monster occasions and it was at Atlanta on the 4th July he was to play to the largest American audience of his career. A month later he was at the Isle Of Wight festival in the UK in the blistering heat and performing to half a million.
By 1971 these really huge festivals were finished as they became more controlled, more restricted venues, and Hendrix, the main attraction at such events was gone.
Present day festival numbers are much more restrained, commercial and costly.

So now have a trip back to a Newport audience in 1969. A time when skies were blue and sun shone, the stage had no roof, views were unrestricted except by someone dumb enough to stand up in front of you (usually dealt with by having stuff thrown at them), the entrance fees were low and most importantly of all.. Jimi would just let it go.