The battle over Woodstock is on.
Dueling concerts will take place Aug. 16 through 18, with both attempting to recapture the essence of the famed 1969 concert on its 50th anniversary.
Original founder and co-producer Michael Lang has announced he’ll hold a festival in a 1,000-acre field in Watkins Glen, NY, to mark the occasion. Meanwhile, the Bethel Woods Center for the Arts, Live Nation and Invnt recently announced their own fest during the same days at the original concert’s site — although they can’t use the Woodstock name.
Lang tells us of the dueling events: “While the original site remains close to my heart, it is no longer a sufficient size to host the extraordinary event we have planned.”
He also plans to focus on “advocacy and sustainability,” noting the original fest was a “reaction to a divided nation, political unrest, an unjust war and a desire for racial and gender equality. We were becoming aware of environmental concerns and had a longing for a more compassionate humanity . . . Today we seem to be revisiting the same lessons we thought had been learned.”