A Sneak Peek...
And this time ... about the "Monterey Festival" that was held today in 1967.
On June 16, 1967, the "Monterey International Pop Music Festival" was opened.
It was an optimistic time, an era of love and innocence, and the three days of the Monterey Pop Festival in California began.
All income from this festival was donated to charity as all the artists who performed at it did so for free and on a full volunteer basis, except for Ravi Shenkar who received a $ 3,000 fee for his performance from the festival organizers, due to his long performance. All the other artists were given a 40-minute slot per show, with some giving shorter performances like The Who who finished their performance after just 25 minutes.
This festival will later be remembered as one of the first major rock festivals in the United States. The first rock festival - Mount Tamalpais - was held about a week before, also in California.
It was also the first festival where artists such as "The Who", Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Otis Redding, Ravi Shankar, and more, would make their first major appearance in the US.
Also appearing at the festival were artists such as "The Byrds", "Grateful Dead", Simon & Garfunkel, Steve Miller Band, "Canned Heat", "The Mamas & the Papas", Janis Joplin, "Buffalo Springfield" and more.
Singer and guitarist John Phillips, from The Mamas & the Papas, and producers Lou Adler and Alan Pariser along with journalist Derek Taylor, conceived, planned, and produced all the festival arrangements in just one week.
The same John Phillips from "the Mamas & the Papas" also wrote the immortal song "San Francisco, (Be Sure To Wear Flowers In Your Hair)" in order to promote the festival. The song would later become a Scott Mackenzie hit.
Some of the performances made by some of the artists at the festival like those of Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin will be remembered forever as one of the highlights of their careers.
One of the founding moments at this festival was the "coin toss" case between Jimi Hendrix and Pete Townsend, which was supposed to determine which of the bands would first perform on the closing night of the festival.
Both bands gained a reputation for smashing their instruments at the end of the show and both claimed to be the first to do so. It was the first major U.S. performance of the two bands and no one wanted to be the one to smash his instrument after the previous cast had already done so.
The coin was tossed and Hendrix lost. The Who performed a 25-minute show which at the end simply shamed the entire stage, including the drum set guitars and amps, in a way that left no chance for Hendrix to overshadow the epic ending.
But there is only one Jimi Hendrix, and the show he gave at that festival is remembered forever as one of the greatest shows in the history of music. At the end of the show, Jimi, who could not compete with the shattering of the instruments of the Who before him, simply set his guitar on fire in a kind of mesmerizing Indian ceremony and thus created the image that will engrave in the history of rock forever !!!
List of the performances held at the festival:
Friday, June 16
· The Association
· The Paupers
· Beverley
· Johnny Rivers
· Eric Burdon and The Animals
· Simon & Garfunkel
Saturday, June 17 · Canned Heat
· Big Brother and the Holding Company
· Country Joe and the Fish
· Al Kooper
· The Butterfield Blues Band
· The Electric Flag
· Quicksilver Messenger Service
· Steve Miller Band
· Moby Grape
· Hugh Masekela
· The Byrds
· Laura Nyro
· Jefferson Airplane
· Booker T. & the M.G.'s
· The Mar-Keys
· Otis Redding
Sunday, June 18 · Ravi Shankar
· The Blues Project
· Big Brother and the Holding Company
· The Group With No Name
· Buffalo Springfield
· The Who
· Grateful Dead
· The Jimi Hendrix Experience
· Scott McKenzie
· The Mamas & the Papas