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’4 Little Madness Is a Good Thing'By THE MISSION SINGERSHundreds of writers have fill-, ed thousands of printed pages in efforts to explain what made Woodstock the real happening of this age.Yet, perhaps none did as good a job as Joni .Mitchell in her composition, Woodstock, as sung by The Assembled Multitude: “We are stardust, billion-year-old carbon, caught in the devil’s bargain, and ~we got to get ourselves back to the garden.”Most Americans today know how to get through everyday occurrences in normal fashion. But come the abnormal or the special — come matters of life and, death — and most Americans are totally disoriented. Most have no way of l-espond-ing that will help them discover the meaning of life and death in those happenings. So,life is shallow and fruitless.For hundreds of thousands of young people, Woodstock was an answer to life and death situations. It was a discovery that auth,entie ritual can provide meaning to a life that ordinarily -hides meaning under a surface cover of superficiality.Ritual is a programmed way of picturing life. In religion, the Eucharistie Sacrifice is a ritual. The Indian peace pipe ceremony is. a kind of ritual.On the other hand, rock festivals — and Woodstock especially — are free-form rituals that strike a responsive chord in millions of young people. During the gold rushes of the last century, prospectors looked forward to that “gold mine in the sky.” Today young people eagerly seek the “perfect rock festival.”1Pop music, rock festivals,Woodstock rituals — these are helping people to learn that life cannot be simply law and order, statute and symmetry. People are discovering that a little madness is a good thing. Despite its failings, “the revolution of the children is ‘ becoming the education of us all,” as the Time essay put it.Woodstock was a unique happening; now it’s a legend, a symbol of America’s rebirth, a ritual of living and being. Woodstock didn’t happen at a special “time of year,” but at a special “time of man.”That time is now, and young people own it. Though we’re not sure exactly what, to do with it, we must use it to find some alternative to the plastic smile of our current society. Woodstock was the beginning of an answer; we must supply the rest.WOODSTOCKI came upon .a child of God; he was walking along the road,And I asked him “Where are you going?” This he told me:“I’m going on down to Yasgur’s Farm,Gonna roll in a rock and roll band.I’m gonna camp out on the land, and try ’n’ get my soul free.”Chorus: We are stardust, we ares golden,And we got to get ourselves back to the garden.“Then can I walk beside you? I have come here to lose the smog And I want to be a cog in something turning.Maybe it is just the time of year,Or maybe it’s the time of man.I don’t know who I am, but life is for learning.”Chorus.By the time we got to Woodstock we were half a million strong And everywhere was song and celebration.And I dreamed I saw the bombersRiding shotgun in the skyTurning into butterflies above our nation.Chorus 2: We are stardust, billion-year-old carbon,Caught in the devil’s bargain,And we got to get ourselves back to the garden.(Copyright 1970 by Siquomb Publishing Corp.)
Newspaper Details
Rochester Courier Journal
Rochester, New York, US
Wed, Oct 28, 1970
Page 40
Full Page
Clipped by
Chase H.
NA, 20 Mar 2024
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