As America celebrates Woodstock—that historic counterculture movement—exactly what does it mean for black folks?
Why We Should Celebrate Woodstock
by John Murph
This weekend marks the 40th anniversary of the Woodstock Music & Art Fair. Hundreds of thousands of folks journeyed to Max Yasgur’s 600-acre farm to hear 32 rock acts, withstanding interminable traffic jams, monsoon-like thunderstorms, mud for days, sub-par sanitary conditions and a dwindling food supply—without resorting to anarchy.
It was—as is evidenced by the plethora of newly released CDs, DVDs, books and movies commemorating that weekend—a seminal moment in rock history. But as we celebrate that historic counterculture movement, exactly what does it mean to black America? For all the post-politicizing of the event, even though it occurred at such a pivotal point in America’s socio-political time (and even more eerie, a week after the Manson murders), Woodstock was a mostly apolitical, escapist affair, save for the implied gestures from Richie Haven’s performance “Freedom/Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child,” Joan Baez’s introductory story about the Federal Marshals taking her husband, David Harris, into custody for “draft evasion.”
The most overt, if seismic political statement occurred Monday morning, coincidentally as most of the attendees had left. Rocking a white, fringed and beaded leather shirt and a red headscarf, Jimi Hendrix launched into his epochal rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner.” His face expressed a calmness as if he was meditating on his memories of his one-year stint in the Army, the fallen soldiers in the Vietnam War, the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.—all at once. After initially squalling out the melody with cathartic release of a Pentecostal gospel singer, Hendrix infused the National Anthem with an improvisatory explosion, marked by fast-fingered runs, whammy-bar-inducing howls, shrieks; he created sonic missiles as if they were dropped from warplanes above. The two-minute rendering became one of the most defining moments in black American music, if not, popular music, worldwide, as Hendrix manipulated dissonance and consonance.
If the underlying message of the festival was “An Aquarian Exposition: 3 Days of Peace and Music,” surely that would have extended to the legions of black Americans, who were routinely beaten, killed and jailed as they strived for equal rights.
Read the Full Essay @ The Root
Why We Should Celebrate Woodstock
by John Murph
This weekend marks the 40th anniversary of the Woodstock Music & Art Fair. Hundreds of thousands of folks journeyed to Max Yasgur’s 600-acre farm to hear 32 rock acts, withstanding interminable traffic jams, monsoon-like thunderstorms, mud for days, sub-par sanitary conditions and a dwindling food supply—without resorting to anarchy.
It was—as is evidenced by the plethora of newly released CDs, DVDs, books and movies commemorating that weekend—a seminal moment in rock history. But as we celebrate that historic counterculture movement, exactly what does it mean to black America? For all the post-politicizing of the event, even though it occurred at such a pivotal point in America’s socio-political time (and even more eerie, a week after the Manson murders), Woodstock was a mostly apolitical, escapist affair, save for the implied gestures from Richie Haven’s performance “Freedom/Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child,” Joan Baez’s introductory story about the Federal Marshals taking her husband, David Harris, into custody for “draft evasion.”
The most overt, if seismic political statement occurred Monday morning, coincidentally as most of the attendees had left. Rocking a white, fringed and beaded leather shirt and a red headscarf, Jimi Hendrix launched into his epochal rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner.” His face expressed a calmness as if he was meditating on his memories of his one-year stint in the Army, the fallen soldiers in the Vietnam War, the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.—all at once. After initially squalling out the melody with cathartic release of a Pentecostal gospel singer, Hendrix infused the National Anthem with an improvisatory explosion, marked by fast-fingered runs, whammy-bar-inducing howls, shrieks; he created sonic missiles as if they were dropped from warplanes above. The two-minute rendering became one of the most defining moments in black American music, if not, popular music, worldwide, as Hendrix manipulated dissonance and consonance.
If the underlying message of the festival was “An Aquarian Exposition: 3 Days of Peace and Music,” surely that would have extended to the legions of black Americans, who were routinely beaten, killed and jailed as they strived for equal rights.
Read the Full Essay @ The Root
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