40 years ago today, the mother of all music festivals opened in Bethel, NY, to celebrate 3 days of peace & music. Taking the stage first was this man, Richie Havens.
I have a personal fondness for Richie, for the richness of his voice, for his distinctive style of guitar playing, his longevity, his spirituality. I’ve never seen him perform live in person, but I have been in his presence…
Nearly 11 years ago, my bride and I were flying from Newark NJ to San Francisco CA on the first leg of our honeymoon flight to Hawaii. One of my then-clients worked as a flight attendant for American Airlines, and Marci was able to arrange for our flight to be upgraded into first class. For a five hour flight, barely a day and a half after our wedding, first class was very much appreciated. We boarded early, and while we were in our second row seats, sitting on the tarmac waiting for the rest of the plane to board, the pilot came out of the cabin to greet the man sitting in the seat directly in front of me. The pilot shook his hand, and told the man he was a big fan of his, but I had no idea who the man was. The black man’s hands made an impression on me as being very big, with rather long, although manicured, fingernails. I remained curious as to who this person could be until much later in our flight, when I got up to use the restroom. On the way back to my seat, I glanced over to see that sitting directly in front of me was Richie Havens. I played it cool – I did not acknowledge his celebrity, ask for an autograph or suggest a photo-op. The rest of the first class passengers were oblivious to Richie, and upon landing in San Francisco, I watched as Richie simply proceeded to walk through the concourse completely unrecognized, until he eventually disappeared into the vastness of the airport.
In retrospect, I’m not sure that I would have done anything differently; I tend to respect the privacy of those people who wish to remain private, as Richie evidently did. I have no proof of any of this, only my wife’s corroborating testimony, but not really knowing who Richie Havens is, she basically took my word for it when I told her who he was. Ah well.
Richie performed “Freedom” at the site of the original 1969 Woodstock Festival concert stage yesterday at noon,
followed by an evening performance at Bethel Woods Center For The Arts.
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