Crosby, Stills & Nash: Still rocking & rolling http://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/article/20090726/LIFE/907260306/1005/LIFE
These days, they're just doing it a little more carefully By John W. Barry • Poughkeepsie Journal July 26, 2009 The set of music Crosby, Stills and Nash performed at the Woodstock Music and Art Fair in 1969 was iconic, historic and remains timeless today. "Their performance was scary, brilliant proof of the magnificence of music, and I don't believe it could have happened with such power anywhere else," music journalist Greil Marcus said in Woodstock promoter Michael Lang's memoir, "The Road to Woodstock." "This was a festival that had triumphed over itself, as (David) Crosby and his band led the way toward the end of it." Graham Nash remembers things differently - "almost getting killed going in; the helicopter tail rotor failing; getting thrown into the ground," he said during a recent telephone interview with the Journal. Tonight, Crosby, Stills and Nash will close out the Gathering of the Vibes music festival in Bridgeport, Conn. Tuesday, the group will play Saratoga Performing Arts Center. But it was 40 years ago, in August 1969, Nash, Crosby and Stephen Stills performed at Woodstock. "I booked Crosby, Stills and Nash before their debut album was released," Lang wrote in "The Road to Woodstock." Their manager, David Geffen, Lang wrote, showed up clutching a test pressing of the band's recently completed recording, their famous, self-titled debut, which included future classics "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" and "Wooden Ships." " 'Wait till you hear this!' Geffen gloated," Lang wrote. "Geffen was looking for the right venue to kick off the band's first tour, and we all agreed Woodstock should be it. I booked them on the spot, paying his asking price of $10,000." Speaking to the Journal recently, Nash said the cornerstone of the Woodstock spirit and legacy was and remains "taking care of your neighbor is what you do." Less in the spirit of Woodstock was thinking 40 years ahead, and pondering what the enduring spirit of Woodstock might be. Nobody, he said, would have thought like that back then. "You're lucky to wake up the next day," he said. "Nobody thought '40 years later.' No one." Four decades later, CSN is still playing "Guinnevere" and "Wooden Ships" and "Helplessly Hoping," the classics that enshrined them as rock 'n' roll royalty. "You have to first of all recognize there's a certain reason people come to see us," Nash said. "We also recognize that, particularly in today's economy, that a dollar is hard to earn. We want to give as much value as possible, as we always have done and always will do. That's why we always go on the road." The group recently released a collection of songs originally cut as demos, and plans to release an album of cover songs - including the Grateful Dead's "Uncle John's Band" - produced by Rick Rubin. CSN returned to the land on which Woodstock was held on Aug. 13, 2006, right around the 37th anniversary of the music and art fair, for a concert at Bethel Woods Center for the Arts, a performing arts pavilion built on the site. They were joined at that show and on that tour by Neil Young, who also performed with them at Woodstock. "It was interesting," Nash said, "to go down and sit where the original stage was." Also interesting are the recollections of Nash and Crosby, captured in Lang's "The Road to Woodstock," about playing Woodstock: "I thought we did a lousy set," Nash is quoted as saying. "When you consider playing acoustic guitars to 400,000 people and trying to reach to the back of the crowd with songs like 'Guinnevere,' it was absurd. But we certainly gave it our best shot. Sure, the 'Suite: Judy Blue Eyes' was a little out of tune, but so what?" Crosby, on the other hand, is quoted in "The Road to Woodstock" saying, "We were good, thank God." "It went down very well. The people who were my close friends - Paul Kantner and Grace Slick (of the Jefferson Airplane), (Jerry) Garcia, and a lot of people - they were all thrilled. They said, 'Wow! You tore it up! It worked.' They loved it, everybody loved it. How could you not love it? 'Suite: Judy Blue Eyes' - what's not to like?" -- Reach John W. Barry at [email protected] or 845-437-4822 . --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Sixties-L" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sixties-l?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
