Woodstock, The Festival Of The Flower Children, Has Had A Huge Impact

Woodstock, the Festival of the Flower Children, has had a huge impact upon the world that we live in now. Not only did it cause so much happiness and pain in 1969, but even in today's society, there are no signs of it fading away. The music of that generation began to fell music as a deeper thing; to them, it was wild, and its wildness freed them from cultural restraints, from the everyday strains that are placed on human beings. It took them to a point where people were free to be naked in public, to talk about having sex, to smoke grass openly with friends, drop acid, have long hair, dress anyway they chose, to experiment and explore life freely. The bands that were scheduled to play at Woodstock and the bands that actually played at the Festival were different. There were some minor changes, but changes were done non the least. For example: The Jeff Beck Group were canceled from the Festival; Iron Butterfly failed to appear; and It's a Beautiful Day was rejected (Woodstock.com). But some of the more noteworthy bands that did play were: Grateful Dead, Jimi Hendrix, Richie Havens, Janis Joplin, Santana, Sweetwater, and The Who. Originally, the performances were scheduled to go from seven o'clock till about midnight the first night of the concert. But later, as everyone seemed to realize, that the people in the crowds weren't going to go to sleep after all that, no way. So the Festival coordinators started running around asking all the bands that already played if they can go back on for a second set. Some of the bands were happy to do so, but others were concerned. They worried because they heard that Woodstock turned into a f ree festival and that the promoters were going to loose there shirts, which both facts were true. So some of the bands started coming up to the business managers demanding cash before they pay, but there was 1 honestly no way to do that in hell. So there main banker, Charlie Prince, got teller's checks from he bank that they were doing business in, and the bands got there money. Another way they burned up time was that the promoters got different people up on stage to do different things. One example, Tom Law, stated: A number of times, Wavy would ask me to lead everyone in yoga from the stage. I would come over and fill in for 15-20 minutes. I would say that this is another way to get high, no drugs. I would tell them to sit in a lotus pose, take deep breaths and exhale every breath. They were just doing things together. It was phenomenal, because it isn't everyday that people do things together like that. (Makower, 14-17). The people that attended the Woodstock Arts and Festival in 1969 were affected in hundreds of different ways. Not only did they have their own mind-expanding drugs and the side effects from that, but they also had to worry about their stay at the concert; where would they sleep, bath, and what would they eat. For the people that actually had affiliation with the Festival itself, the stay wasn't all that bad. The commission rented out basically whole hotels, the artists had helicopter rides to and fro as they pleased, and lots of food too. The Red Top was a favorite place, there was a pool at that hotel, although it was drained. But every night you could hear and see people having sex in there. An unfortunate thing happened to that hotel, however, the night before the festival, someone set the hotel on fire (Makower, 85-86). For the common folk life wasn't so easy. First off, the area, which was surrounded by swamps and poison ivy, got lots of people rashes and sort of sick. It was possibly Bob Dylan's doctors who at first helped everyone, and then the Hog Farmers helped in immensely. The Hog Farmers were vital for setting the right tone for the festival. They were the unofficial security force-The Please Force- and Wavy Gravy was the Chief of Please. They wore orange armbands 2 showing a hog sitting on the neck of a guitar, they ran the free-food