BIRMINGHAM RECORD COLLECTORS
DEDICATED TO THE COLLECTING OF MUSIC, ITS PRESERVATION AND LASTING FRIENDSHIP
THIS MONTH’S MEETING
THE SECOND SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 10TH 2:00 PM
HOMEWOOD PUBLIC LIBRARY 1721 OXMOOR RD BIRMINGHAM, AL 35209
NEXT MEETING, OCTOBER 8TH 2:00 PM THE SECOND SUNDAY
THE BIRMINGHAM RECORD COLLECTORS 2023 RECORD SHOW
The 38th annual BRC Record Show finished with an attendance high since we have been at the Gardendale Civic Center and many years before that. Each attendee was given a wrist band so we would have an ideal of the number attending. We gave out 885 of these wrist bands! Personality I had hoped for 800 so I am very pleased as all members are. But the number of attendees is only part of the story. Seeing the people leaving with an arm full or sack full of records is what helps the dealers and they are who we are there for. Getting the people in and having them buying items. Thanks to the dealers for continuing to be a part of the BRC show.
THIS MONTH’S MEETING
We had a great time hearing from Larry Parker last month. Larry drove from just north of Atlanta to be with us even with a broken hip that is still on the mend. Larry was a part of the early rock & roll scene around Birmingham and has so much knowledge of what was happening with music at the time. He does plan on coming back soon to share some other stories with us. Stay tuned.
This month we will be reviewing the record show and then play some music. Come join us not just for the music but for the fellowship as well. See ya there.
AUGUST 1969
Spending so much time getting ready for the record show didn’t allow me much time to come up with an article or story this month. So I am using a piece I put together a few years back about an event that occurred during the month of August although this is the September newsletter. Our August newsletter is usually when I print the bios of our newest BRC Music Hall of Fame inductees. I call the movie, Woodstock the greatest musical ever done. Was it a musical? Sure. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this repeat from a previous BRC newsletter. A bonus part has been added showing what the performers were paid.
AN AQUARIAN EXPOSITION – AUGUST 15, 16, 17 1969:
It has been 47 years ago this month since Jimi Hendrix strummed the last guitar note at what has become to be known simply as ‘Woodstock’. The event was originally billed as ‘Woodstock Music & Art Fair. An Aquarian Exposition: 3 Days of Peace & Music’. Well, it lasted 4 days, not 3, it was not held in Woodstock but 60 miles away in Bethel, New York, the promoters estimate of 50,000 people, which is what they told the officials in Bethel, ballooned to somewhere between 400,00 – 500,000 and by the time Hendrix played, 9 AM Monday morning, the crowd had dwindled to about 25,000 – I can’t imagine how those who left before he played feel when they think back on it. The event is listed as one of the top 50 Moments that Changed the History of Rock and Roll by Rolling Stone Magazine.
The whole idea began as a way for 2 investors to do what investors do, make money. John Roberts had an inheritance and he and a friend were searching for a way to use it so they placed an ad in the New York Times which read, “Young men with unlimited capital looking for interesting, legitimate investment opportunities and business propositions.” Along came Michael Lang and Artie Kornfeld. These two were wanting some capital to use to build a recording studio studio in Woodstock, New York. With Bob Dylan and The Band already residing in the area they felt it would be a good place to build a studio. It was away from big cities, had picturesque scenery, and would be a good place to build a studio-in-the-woods. The four got together and as talks went on they all agreed that they would first put on a concert that would draw about 50,000 people. So in January 1969, Woodstock Ventures was formed.
First they had to find a venue. The town of Woodstock shot down the idea of a concert and an event of this type being held in their town. Saugerties, New York was a hopeful site but things didn’t pan out there either. The town of Wallkill, New York was then approached. The guys found an industrial park there and thought it would make a good place. The residents of Wallkill did not like the idea of what type people may show up in their town so there was a law passed that prevented the guys from using the town – this was on July 2 and they only had 6 weeks to find a venue and they already had performers signed. Finally through friends of friends, Michael Lang was taken to a farm which was owned by Max Yasgur. This was in the town of Bethel, New York. Lang felt the contour of the land and a nearby pond offered a perfect place for a stage and gave everyone a nice countryside view. Although some of the town officials and residents put up a fight, they finally had their venue, 60 miles from where they had hoped to hold the concert. Over time, two songs were written using Max Yasgur as the influence. Mountain recorded ‘For Yasgur’s Farm’ and in the lyrics of ‘Woodstock’ by CSNY a man who is asked where are you going says ‘I’m going down to Yasgur’s farm. Gonna join in a rock and roll band.’
Before all the hassle about getting a venue and Max Yasgur’s farm was finally signed, sealed, and delivered, the promoters had already had tickets printed and had they were being sold in record stores in the greater New York City area as well as by mail through a post office box at the Radio City Post Office. Originally tickets in advance cost $18 for the whole 3 day event or $24 at the gate – even at today’s prices that was quite a bargain. What started out as a projection of 50,000 attendees was now raised to 200,000 as 184,000 advance tickets had been sold. One more point about tickets. 1-day and 2-day passes were also sold at $7 and $13 respectively. I don’t know how they thought they could get anyone to leave after 1 or 2 days.
On the week of the concert the organizers had to decide whether to put more money into fences and ticket booths or the stage. With tens of thousands of people already ascending, with and without tickets, they decided to put up the best stage they could and thus the concert became the infamous ‘free concert’. As word spread that it was now free, thousands more headed that way. Before long there were hundreds of thousands of concert goers on the grounds and many more thousands who were turned around due to closed roads. The organizers had to hire helicopters to shuttle in some of the performers. During his performance, Arlo Guthrie made the announcement to the audience that the New York Thurway had been closed. According to some historians this never occurred.
The sound system is one that I envy very much and think I’ll use when I move to the countryside in years to come. 70 foot towers were built to hold 16 loudspeakers. Marine plywood cabinets weighing half a ton apiece and were 6 ft tall, 4 ft deep, and 3 ft wide were built to hold 4 – 15 in. JBL D140 loudspeakers. The tweeters consisted of 4X2 Cell and 2X10 Cell Altec Horns. Can’t wait to hear how mine sounds.
Now, how about the performers. The first act signed was CCR. At the time they were one of the hottest acts going and signing them helped persuade other acts to follow suit. They were to receive $10,000. The line-up of acts was very impressive but no more than many other line-ups for the many music festivals that were held during 1967-69. Hendrix was there but he was also at the Monterey International Pop Festival in 1967 with the likes of The Who, Janis Joplin, Jefferson Airplane, Grateful Dead, The Animals, The Mamas and the Papas, Johnny Rivers, The Byrds, and the official introduction to the USA of Otis Redding. Redding up until Monterey had performed live to mostly black audiences and a few successful shows at the Whiskey A-Go-Go. There were also major festivals during this time in LA, Miami, San Fran, Altamont, Newport, Atlanta, Denver, New Orleans, and the Texas Pop Festival. The thing that makes Woodstock stand out is the number of people who attended.
If you saw the movie you missed some of the acts that performed but not what was considered to be the best of the best. Some memorable performances include Santana and their rendering of the song ‘Soul Sacrifice’. And how about Sly and The Family Stone, performing between 3-4 AM Sunday morning, and Sly’s white jacket and pants with fringe running up and down both sleeves. He seemed to be having much fun playing his keyboard and getting the people into every note of his songs. And of course you remember during the song ‘I Want To Take You Higher’ how he asked the crowd to put up the peace sign when they sang the words, ‘I Want To Take You Higher’, telling them that if they did so ‘It will do you no harm’. And then The Who coming on right after Sly at 5 AM. During some of the songs Roger Daltrey would hold onto the mic chord and throw the mic in circles then catching it he would continue singing. He was decked out in what looked lik a buckskin jacket, wearing no shirt, that was lined with long fringe running up and down both sides. And then there was Pete Townsend with his classic windmill guitar strumming and then there was their fantastic version of ‘Summertime Blues’. And speaking of his guitar, at the end of their set he started jamming the butt of the guitar into the stage while holding the neck until finally the sound out of the amp sounded like a busted fuse. And then he tossed the guitar into the audience. Where is that guitar now? Well, according to liner notes that came with ‘The Kids Are Alright’ DVD it was retrieved by a roadie of The Who. There is some evidence that confirms this. Joe Cocker was making his first American tour which Woodstock became a part of after his manager heard about the concert while the US tour was going on. Cocker will always be remembered for his version of ‘With A Little Help From My Friends (or as he said during his intro to the song, ‘Me Friends’).
One of my best memories of the documentary is Ten Years After, with Alvin Lee on guitar and vocals, doing ‘I’m Going Home’. If you didn’t see the movie but have heard the song on a 45 or the LP cut, find the movie version and watch it. It will do you no harm. At the end of their performance he began waving to the crowd with a big smile on his face and then something appeared on stage rolling towards Alvin. Someone had rolled a watermelon on the stage. He picked it up and balancing it on his shoulder, almost losing it for a moment, he walked off the stage. By the way, Alvin introduced the song, ‘I’m Going Home’ by saying, ‘Here’s, ‘I’m Going Home’ – by helicopter.’
And then the rains came. As The Who were finishing their set at dawn on Sunday morning you could see the rain clouds were forming. It had rained off and on before but nothing like what was coming. During Sunday a torrential rainstorm came and stopped the concert. Along with the rain came strong winds. The announcer on stage was telling everyone to take cover and they’d start the concert again as soon as possible. He mentioned getting away from and off of the 70 ft towers that were set for the sound system probably 2-3 dozen times. It was a big mess but some of the people managed to have a little fun with it all using a muddy areas as a ‘slip and slide’. And of course the government was blamed by a few. One guy in the movie walks up to an interviewer and says something about the ‘fascist pigs’ flying in planes and dusting the clouds to make the rain. The rain is what caused the concert to be delayed and not finish until Monday morning.
All in all the movie, Woodstock gave a definitive feel for music and performers from the late 60’s and is well worth watching although being 3 hours in length it’s hard to sit and watch it without stopping for a break. There is a newer version of the movie that came out in 1994 that has more of the acts performing that were left out either due to their request (John Fogerty – CCR) or the director didn’t feel the performances were as good as the ones chosen. It is 45 minutes longer than the original and included more of the Hendrix set.
Some of the acts that didn’t make the original movie cut included Janis Joplin, CCR, Mountain, Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, The Band, Johnny Winter, and Blood, Sweat & Tears. And who was asked to appear at Woodstock but declined? How about Bob Dylan, The Doors, Led Zeppelin, The Byrds, Chicago, Tommy James & The Shondells, The Moody Blues, Frank Zappa & The Mothers Of Invention, Free, Joni Mitchell, Procol Harum, Jethro Tull, Iron Butterfly, and Roy Rogers. Yes, Roy was asked to close the festival with ‘Happy Trails’ but he declined.
Here’s a few other notable facts about Woodstock: Although not in the movie and not on video tape as far as I can find, Abbie Hoffman rushed the stage as The Who were performing, took the mic and started a rant about freeing someone from jail and that that was more important than this concert. Pete Townsend let him know in no small measure to ‘get off my stage’, hitting him with his guitar neck and then telling everyone that the next one to interfere with them will be killed. Two babies that were reportedly born at Woodstock seems to be a little misleading. One baby was born en route to the concert and one was born at a local hospital after the mom was airlifted out of the concert while in labor. But no one knows for sure about those births. There seems to be 2 recorded deaths. One was a heroine overdose and the other was a man who was run over by a tractor while sleeping in a hay field.
One fact that has to be mentioned concerns the cover of the first Woodstock LP. The cover shows a couple standing in this muddy field holding on to each other and wrapped in a blanket. The couple are Bobbi Kelly and Nick Ercoline. The couple married 2 years after Woodstock and are still a happily married couple. (Update on Bobbi & Nick. Bobbi Ercoline passed away March 18, 2023. She and Nick were married 52 years)
Many of the performers are no longer with us. Janis, Jimi, Sly, Joe Cocker, Alvin Lee (Ten Years After), Johnny Winter, Entwistle and Moon of The Who, Tom Fogerty of CCR, Ritchie Havens, 3 members of Canned Heat, at least 1 member of The Family Stone, 2 members of Jefferson Airplane, Danko, Helm, Manuel and Robertson of The Band, David Crosby and the man who bankrolled Woodstock, John Roberts. I’m sure there are other band members who performed who have passed away also.
‘Woodstock’ really filled the bill for a documentary about the music and performers of the mid to late 1960’s. Throw in all the interviews of concert attendees, the residents of Bethel, the people who were there as workers and volunteers, the performers, 2 of the organizers, Lang and Kornfeld, and one memorable interview of the port-a-john worker who while cleaning one of the stalls was told by the interviewer he was doing a good job and he replied he was glad to do for the kids and how one of his sons is there in attendance and one of his sons is during a tour in Viet Nam flying helicopters at the DMZ. I had a lot of respect for that man and I hope his son made it back OK. And when you reflect on the term he used, ‘kids’, you recall how all those in the movie are captured for a brief moment of their life and they were just kids having fun. Fun movie, reflecting the good and bad times of the era, and one film you can go to if you want to see that era’s music performed live. Maybe one day I can make a trip to what was then Max Yasgur’s farm and see if I can hear music from Hendrix and all the others still echoing.
How much the performers got paid
Jimi Hendrix $18,000 Johnny Winter $3,750
Blood, Sweat & Tears $15,000 Ten Years After $3,250
Joan Baez $10,000 Country Joe & The Fish $2,500
CCR $10,000 Grateful Dead $2,500
The Band $7,500 The Incredible String Band $2,250
Janis Joplin $7,500 Mountain $2,000
Jefferson Airplane $7,500 Tim Hardin $2,000
Sly & The Family Stone $7,000 Joe Cocker $1,375
Canned Heat $6,500 Sweetwater $1,200
The Who $6,250 John Sebastian $1,000
Ritchie Havens $6,000 Melanie $750
Arlo Gutrie $5,000 Santana $750
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young $5,000 Sha Na Na $750
Ravi Shankar $4,500 Keef Hartley $500
Quill $375
Compare Joan Baez, Ritchie Havens and Arlo Guthrie’s payment to Joe Cocker, Santana and even The Grateful Dead. I know some of these had been around longer than others but Havens gets $6,000 and Santana got $750. ??? There has to be more to the story than I have read.
See ya,
Charlie
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