Fifty years back, on a mid-August afternoon, a crowd numbering a few lakhs gathered at a dairy farm near New York for a music festival which promised ‘three days of peace and music,’ a message against the then ongoing Vietnam War. Thirty bands, among them the biggest musicians of the day, put in the performances of their lifetime.

Many who became part of the festival did not realise that they are going to be part of musical history, that the Woodstock Music Festival has now become.

The impact that the festival had across the world, as a counter-cultural movement and as the coming together of some legendary musicians, was immense. So much so that, it was felt even in far away Thiruvananthapuram, through the radio shows and magazines of the 1960s and 70s. Some of those veteran music buffs and musicians of the city are now coming together to organise the fiftieth anniversary of the festival later this month.

Featuring bands and musicians including Souljam, Dr.John, Aravind, The B-Flat, guitarist Rajasekharan, Marie and Nandu Leo, the ‘Woodstock 50’ concert will be organised at the Fortune South Park Hotel on August 25 at 7 p.m. “We have been organising a series of concerts titled the Hard Days’ Night, once every two months. Since Woodstock is a festival that has had major influence, we thought of celebrating its fiftieth anniversary. The bands would be presenting songs which were performed at Woodstock. At the backdrop, the corresponding visuals of the particular song from Woodstock would be screened so that people could easily identify the artiste. We have been planning for this for the past one year,” says Tommy Cherian, one of the organisers. According to Jilu George, vocalist of The B-Flat, her band has chosen songs from artistes like Janis Joplin and Joan Baez for their performance.

“We will be performing Joplin’s ‘Me and Bobby Mcgee’, Baez’s ‘Diamonds and Rust’ and a couple of other songs,” she says. The other bands will be performing songs by Creedence Clearwater Revival, Jimi Hendrix, Crosby, Stills & Nash and Joe Cocker. Shashi Tharoor, MP, will be the guest of honour.

Radio shows

“Most of us organising this festival are not musicians, but music aficionados. In those days, we heard about the festival from radio shows like Tommy Vance’s ‘Rock Salad’ in BBC, Radio Australia and the Voice of America. Then there were magazines which used to set aside space for music, like the JS Magazine from Calcutta. For us, this is a get-together, more than anything else,” says Mr.Cherian.