Tag Archives: Woodstock Music and Art Fair

Birthdays, Music of the 60s, Woodstock Music and Art Fair

Bluesman Paul Vaughn Butterfield

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Bluesman Paul Vaughn Butterfield

December 17, 1942 – May 4, 1987
Paul Butterfield
Paul Butterfield Blues Band

Remembering Paul Butterfield

Paul Butterfield was born in Chicago on December 17, 1942. He initially started playing the flute, but the magnetism of Chicago’s blues pulled him in and the harmonica became his instrument.

Butterfield began performing with fellow blues enthusiasts Nick Gravenites and Elvin Bishop and with the addition of a few others, including Michael Bloomfield, formed the Butterfield Blues Band.

Bluesman Paul Vaughn Butterfield

Newport 1965

Bluesman Paul Vaughn Butterfield
Paul Butterfield Blues Band at Newport

It was at that famous Newport Folk Festival of 1965, that Butterfield first met fame. Well-received by many there (electric blues was not what some came to hear), particularly by a young guy named Bob Dylan, Dylan invited some of the band to back him on part of his performance. Electric Dylan! Definitely not what some came to hear.

Like Paul Revere, Paul Butterfield helped deliver the big news: Dylan ain’t gonna work on Maggie’s farm no more:

Bluesman Paul Vaughn Butterfield

Vinyl Butterfield

Butterfield released seven albums with Elektra Records and later four albums for manager Albert Grossman’s Bearsville Records.

He also performed at the Woodstock Music and Art Fair on Monday morning after Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young and before Sha Na Na. Quite a placement! Here’s a great video from that performance:

Solo

The Blues band ended and he went solo. In 1976 he was part of the amazing line-up for The Band’s Last Waltz.

Bluesman Paul Vaughn Butterfield

Sessions

Over the next few years, Butterfield mostly confined himself to session work. He began to play more gigs in Los Angeles during the early ’80s, and eventually relocated there permanently; he also toured on a limited basis during the mid-’80s, and in 1986 released his final album, The Legendary Paul Butterfield Rides Again.

Paul Butterfield died on May 4, 1987.

R & R H of F

In 2015 he was (finally) inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (with band members Mike Bloomfield, Elvin Bishop, Mark Naftalin, Jerome Arnold, Billy Davenport and Sam Lay) (New York Times obituary)

Bluesman Paul Vaughn Butterfield
Birthdays, Today in history, Woodstock Music and Art Fair

Woodstock Ventures Michael Lang

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Woodstock Ventures Michael Lang

Remembering Michael Lang on his birthday
December 11, 1944 – January 8, 2022

If you’ve arrived here directly or via Facebook, I will assume that you are already familiar with Mr Lang and who he is. I’ll just bullet-point a few facts about him.

  • he was born in Brooklyn, New York
  • in 1967, he moved to Coconut Grove, Florida and  opened a head shop: papers, posters, black lights, and similar things to help enhance one’s day.
Woodstock Ventures Michael Lang
Woodstock Ventures Michael Lang
  • in 1968,  Lang assisted in the production of the 1968 Miami Pop Festival.” It featured Steppenwolf, the Jimi Hendrix Experience, The Mothers of Invention, Blue Cheer, Crazy World of Arthur Brown,Chuck Berry, The Blues Image, Pacific Gas and Electric, and Three Dog Night.
Woodstock Ventures Michael Lang
  • he left Miami and moved to Woodstock, NY. He also spent a lot of time in NYC where he and Artie Kornfeld came up with the idea to create a recording studio in Woodstock for the growing number of so-called “underground” musicians living there such as Paul Butterfield, Van Morrison, and others. Of course, Bob Dylan was there, too.
  • he, Kornfeld, John Roberts, and Joel Rosenman formed Woodstock Venturers for that purpose.
    Woodstock Ventures Michael Lang

    Woodstock Ventures Michael Lang
    August 18, 2013, Michael Lang and Joel Rosenman at memorial service for Richie Havens at Bethel Woods Center for the Arts (photo by James Shelley)
  •  he did not help produce the Altamont Free Concert in December 1969, but he did assist in the relocation of the event after it had to be moved.
  • Lang also managed several successful international recording artists, including Joe Cocker, Rickie Lee Jones, Willie DeVille, Tarkan, and Spanish recording artists El Ultimo de la Fila.
  • Lang owned and operated Just Sunshine Records, which produced and released more than 40 albums by such diverse musical artists as Karen Dalton, Betty Davis, and Mississippi Fred McDowell.
  • Today, Woodstock.com is a place where people can explore what Michael Lang and the others involved in Woodstock Venture are up to and offering now.

Death

Michael Lang died at Sloan Kettering hospital in New York. He was 77.

Michael Pagnotta, a rep for Lang and longtime family friend, confirmed the promoter’s death to Rolling Stone, adding that the cause was a rare form of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

Remembrance

Michael Lang’s death was obviously in the news everywhere. Likely hundreds of obituaries and remembrances could be found. I chose the following from Bill Hanley, the person who did the sound at Woodstock:

Michael Lang died on January 8, 2022.

He was a friend of mine. We worked together at many festival gigs, most notably Woodstock ’69.
Because of my experience Michael believed I would deliver the best possible sound, and I did.
He told me decades later he knew I could be trusted to be fully conscious all the time because I didn’t do drugs or drink. He was right.
In the past month there has been much written and broadcast about Michael, all favorable and to which I don’t feel I could add anything more to this distinguished person’s character.
Except one thing…
For the summer of August, 2019, because plans for the 50th Woodstock Event were canceled, Michael came up to Yasgur’s Farm in Bethel, NY. Me, my wife, my son and all his friends, Rona Elliot and Henry Diltz were staying at Max Yasgur’s house (graciously offered to us by Jeryl Abramson, now owner of Yasgur’s Farm).
Michael was a celebrity when he came, everyone was thrilled to see him. With an extended hand shake he humbly spoke to everyone. After the drum circle and the place calmed down me, my wife Rhoda, Rona and Michael were left sitting around Max’s kitchen table. The four of us started talking about our childhoods, our families, telling stories. Some were so funny we were just bending over the table with laughter. Into the wee hours of the early morning we shared our past. I got to know Michael and he got to know us just as plain ordinary people. No rock ‘n roll, not show biz just human beings with stories, many just totally hilarious. I treasure this night.
I will miss Michael.
February 3. 22
Woodstock Ventures Michael Lang
Music et al, Woodstock Music and Art Fair

Incredible Robin Williamson

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Incredible Robin Williamson

November 24, 1943

Happy birthday to you!

Who is Robin Williamson? He is best known being in the Incredible String Band. The band enjoyed international popularity mainly in the mid-60s. That popularity was sufficiently strong to merit an invitation to the Woodstock Music and Art Fair. The apocryphal tale is that though scheduled to play on Friday with other folk-type artists, they refused to play in that night’s rain and their performance was pushed to Saturday between the much louder electric blues of the Keef Hartley Band and Canned Heat. Not the best spot for a group of tranquil and introspective musicians using acoustic instruments.

They also did not make it into the movie or the album the following year.

Incredible Robin Williamson
Robin Williamson, Incredible String Band, far right

Listening to their set today [rather than looking at a crowd of 400,000 young people some of whom were wondering, perhaps, “Who were these people?”], dedicated fans hear the songs that made the band popular, but not famous. The crowd gave them warm applause following the set.

Incredible Robin Williamson

Hippie zeitgeist

An interesting thing is that ISB reflected the hippie zeitgeist as loved by those whose ears wiggled a bit when someone said, “Hobbit” or “Lord of the Rings.” The sense of a simpler past, yet still with the shadow of evil not far away. Even Bilbo Baggins didn’t start out with a sense of adventure.

Incredible Robin Williamson

Site info

From Robin Williams’s site today: founder in the 1960’s of the Incredible String Band and of the Merry Band in the 70’s Robin has been at the forefront of the storytelling revival in Britain and America since the 1980’s.

He was the first to focus on the restoration of Celtic Harp to it’s ancient role as spontaneous accompaniment to spoken word.

He continues to tour internationally solo and as a duo with his wife ,singer multi -instrumentalist , Bina Williamson.

A most prolific and diverse songwriter ,Robin has made numerous records over his 50 year career ,most recently for ECM and Quadrant as well as on his own label Pigs Whisker Music.Twice nominated for a Grammy he is cited as an influence by Paul McCartney, Led Zeppelin and many contemporary acoustic and new folk artists.

Incredible Robin Williamson

Today

Incredible Robin Williamson
Robin and Bina Williamson

Robin Williamson and his wife Bina continue to perform regularly through out the United Kingdom. A recent news piece describing them for an upcoming concert stated:

They will perform a programme of original and traditional, magical and mystical songs, stories and music, garnered over Robin’s varied 50-year musical career.

In that time he has gained a worldwide reputation, while Bina is a gifted singer-songwriter,and multi-instrumentalist in her own right.

Their music has been described by Robert Plant as “pure beauty through simplicity” and features east-west harmonies with harp, bowed psaltery and various other instruments. (click for site: Robin and Bina Williamson article)

Incredible Robin Williamson

Storyteller

And if you have a little time, perhaps you’d like to roll up and listen to Robin tell “A Tale of the Deeds of the Tuatha Dé Danann.” It is “a bardic account of the two battles of Moytura, the sacred megalithic complex in Sligo. From the magical lore of ancient Ireland, this tale recounts conflicts of the ancestors at the dawn of the world. Stark, strange, beautiful, violent and hinting always at hidden truths, this of all ancient Celtic stories presents an insight into Druidic allegorical teachings.” 

Delightful.

Incredible Robin Williamson

Painter

He had his first international exhibition in 2013 in the Catalonian town of Olot, renowned for its key role in early 20th century art.

If you have an enquiry please ring
Pigs Whisker Music 0044(0)2920231739
Or write  to
Pigs Whisker Music
P O box 309
Cardiff CF11 9HH
South Wales UK

Incredible Robin Williamson