*UPDATE* Michael Lang, Producer and co-creator of the original Woodstock Festival in 1969, and his team has reached out to clarify that he is producing a separate event, the “official anniversary, but not at Bethel Woods.”
Michael Lang: “While the original site in Bethel remains close to our hearts, it no longer has the capacity to hold a real Woodstock Festival. I’m delighted that Bethel Woods is doing events in the coming year to celebrate what we brought to life in 1969 and I encourage people to visit the museum and concert venue.”
In the next few weeks, Lang will shortly be announcing his plans for the real Woodstock 50th Festival to bring back the much-needed spirit and energy of the 1969 original.
Plans are finally coming together for a multi-day music event in celebration of Woodstock‘s upcoming 50th anniversary at the original location of the historic music festival. The Bethel Woods Center for the Arts announced on Thursday that a three-day event will take place on August 16th-18th in 2019, and will be held at the same location where the original Woodstock Music & Arts Festival took place back on August 15th-17th, 1969.
The official event is being branded as Bethel Woods Music and Culture Festival, with the tagline reading, “celebrating the golden anniversary at the historic site of the 1969 Woodstock festival.” The Facebook page goes on to state that three-day event will be aimed towards fans across all age generations, and will plan on featuring live music, TED-style talks, and special exhibits. The announcement did not include the names of any artists or possible guests who will partake in the 50th-anniversary event, but performer lineup and tickets announcements will be coming soon, presumably sometime shortly after the start of the new year.
The 2019 event will be produced by Live Nation, with a live experiential marketing agency known as INVNT also coming on to help bring the project to life. Other reports have stated that local resident and co-founder of the original Woodstock, Michael Lang, is also planning to stage his own celebratory event, although no announcement has come from his camp as of yet.
Some 400,000 music fans and adventurous souls were estimated to have attended the original Woodstock, which was famously underprepared for the masses with a lack of water and food. Still, even with rain-drenched grounds and organizers being unprepared for the peaceful gathering that would assemble on the farmland in upstate New York, the event remains as a pivotal moment in music and cultural history in American entertainment. Artists including Joan Baez; Santana; members of The Who and Grateful Dead; Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young; Ten Years After; And Country Joe McDonald are just a few of the surviving performers who were at the 1969 event who could possibly return to perform again this summer.
Fans are recommended to go to Bethel Wood Center website to subscribe for updates as plans for the 50th-anniversary event continue to unfold.
