World Series of Rock 50th Anniversary exhibit opens at the Rock Hall’s Library & Archives

CLEVELAND, Ohio - The World Series of Rock concerts, which ran from 1974 through 1980, are the stuff of local legend. Much like the July ‘72 Rolling Stones concert at The Akron Rubber Bowl (”they booed Stevie Wonder!”), seemingly every dedicated rock fan of a certain age (i.e., Boomers) claims to have been to at least one show. But given the size of the old Cleveland Municipal Stadium, which held more than 80,000, and the relatively free-for-all nature of the shows, there’s a solid chance all of those “I-was-there-” folks are telling the truth.

On Wednesday, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Library and Archives, located at 2809 Woodland Ave., in Cleveland opened a new exhibit commemorating the 50th Anniversary of the World Series of Rock (yes, it’s been half a century; feel free to take a moment to feel old, if necessary). The exhibit culls fun, interesting and, for many, memory-sparking artifacts spread throughout the library space. The World Series of Rock exhibit will be at the Library & Archives through the rest of the year. For folks who missed the opening, throughout July and August, the library will host more open house dates and interested folks can also schedule appointments at rockhall.com.

Among the fun things to see are a custom Les Paul used by Joe Walsh on “Rocky Mountain Way,” and played by Walsh with his band Barnstorm at the 1974 WSoR, reproduced setlists from Yes’ 1975 appearance, Aerosmiths’ 1979 show and others. An installation of WSoR-related articles from The Plain Dealer writer Jane Scott near her stately statue and a plethora of photos of fans, some sober, others clearly not. There are vintage video clips of fans and performers screening on a monitor and many classic band shots by local photographers and authors including, Janet Macoska, Anastasia Pantsios, Fran Belkin and Mike Petrello, all of whom were present and signing books and photos for the opening.

Also on site was Jules Belkin, half of Belkin Productions, the beloved duo of Jules and Mike Belkin, who produced the innovative concert series.

“This is really a great tribute. They put together some good stuff,” Belkin, who lent some artifacts to the exhibit, said.

“I was kind of surprised when they called and said they wanted to do this. I just thought it was very thoughtful, but the more you talk to a lot of people, it was so important. It was a group of years that are etched in their memories. It’s there,” he said.

Among those memories are sets by iconic bands, including Pink Floyd (June ’77), The Rolling Stones (June ’75, July ‘78), Fleetwood Mac (August ’78), Peter Frampton (August ’77) and Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band (July ‘80).

There weren’t too many other cities staging massive stadium shows with great lineups when the Belkins started The World Series of Rock. Out West, the Belkins Brothers’ very friendly rival, promoter Bill Graham began his “Day On The Green” series around the same time, but here in the midwest, the Belkins were true innovators.

“In those days everything we did really was rather unique with the numbers of bands on each of the shows and the quality of bands. Most of the bands that were on the World Series of Rock are in the Rock Hall, so we did a good bunch of choosing,” he said chuckling.

Belkin also noted that often when people ask him about a particular show, he has no memory of the actual sets, because he was too busy working to enjoy the musical fruits of he and his brother’s labor.

As folks perused the artifacts a common theme was, “can you believe it’s been 50 years?”

Andy Leach, Senior Director of Museum & Archival Collections at the Rock Hall, admitted that he was a little jealous that he was too young to have experienced the kind of concert atmosphere that simply doesn’t happen anymore.

“It was pretty pioneering in terms of massive concerts like that. I don’t think there will ever be anything quite like that again. From what I’ve heard from friends of mine, you could wander right up to the stage, it was easy to get closer and if you wanted, you could sit in the back and just chill,” Leach said.

He also noted a symmetry between the anniversary of the series, which took place at the stadium that has since been replaced, and what’s happening in the area now.

“It’s cool that (the WSoR) was a big part of the lakefront experience back then. And now we’re expanding our museum. 50 years later, we’re doing the biggest expansion of our museum’s history and that kind of ties into that too. So we’re really happy to celebrate this and preserve that history and tell people about it,” Leach said.