August 16th 1969 was the second day of the now famous Woodstock Music Festival, so let’s continue to look at what happened that day…
The performers that day were John Sebastian, The Incredible String Band, Canned Heat, Mountain, Quill, Country Joe McDonald, C.C.R., The Grateful Dead, The Who, Sly and the Family Stone, and Jefferson Airplane. John Sebastian was not on the original bill, but was in crowd and asked the organizers if he could play. Mountain was so new; this appearance was only their 3rd time on stage together.
Did you know that Richie Havens opened the festival that August 15th, 1969, but was not supposed to be the first act? The opening acts Sweetwater and Ravi Shankar were stuck in traffic, so the organizers talked Richie into kicking off the show. The song “Freedom” was written the moment Richie began to play it. Listen to what we’re saying; Richie Havens got in a groove and improvised the song “Freedom” on stage for the very first time. He later confessed that he wanted to see the movie/documentary so he could learn how to play it again.
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