Mainly remembered as the first musician to play at the iconic
1969 Woodstock concert, does anyone still remember Richie Havens for his other “causes”?
By: Ringo Bones
To anyone with musicological and musical skills born way
after the iconic 1969 Woodstock concert, we remember American folk icon Richie
Havens more for his playing his trusty Guild D30 acoustic guitar in Open D
tuning and opening up our minds to the pressing environmental and social issues
that were topical since the 1960s. Despite opening for the 1969 Woodstock on
August 15, 1969, the original Woodstock was remembered more for Jimi Hendrix than
Richie Havens.
Sadly Richie Havens passed away back in April 22, 2013 of a
heart attack. It is quite ironic that he passed away during this year’s Earth
Day given he is as famous in the environmental causes front as in the folk rock
music scene. Whenever he makes a guest appearance – like the 1970 Woodstock
movie documentary and co-starring with Richard Pryor in the movie Greased
Lightning, Richie Havens managed to recruit a new cadre of fans. For those born
way after the 1969 Woodstock and came of age during the seminal days of the Seattle
Grunge movement in the early 1990s, the younger generation of Richie Havens
fans probably first saw him during the then US President Bill Clinton’s first
inauguration back in January 1993 and later on, when Havens’ became the spokesperson
on Paolo Soleri’s Arcosanti – a utopian community designed in the middle of the
desert for environmentally sustainable living. Sadly, Frank Lloyd Wright –
inspired architect Paolo Soleri passed away earlier in April 9, 2013.
Richie Havens was still active musically and through his various
environmental causes just weeks before he passed away. Whether you know him
from the original 1969 Woodstock or on a mid 1990s Discovery Channel documentary
about the environmentally sustainable utopian city of Paolo Soleri’s Arcosanti,
Richie Havens will surely be missed despite not being played out to death like
his more famous contemporaries from the 1960s.
