Jurek Owsiak invites you to the 15th Przystanek Woodstock Festival!

It was 40 years ago. Michael Lang, John Roberts, Joel Rosenman and Artie Kornfeld – four guys who were on a roll with their huge rock concerts decided to make a good use of their success. They invited young people to a spot about one hundred miles from New York City and organized the famous Woodstock Festival.

The name list of the stars who were supposed to come was really impressive, so the originators hoped to sell a few dozen thousands tickets quite easily. You could get a ticket for 9 dollars 90 cents (by the way – the tickets looked quite simple and uninteresting compared with the ones used today). As we know, it was a huge success.
The creators of the Woodstock Festival referred to their brainchild as to “the days of love and peace”, and the name perfectly fitted the American 1960’s. Their world was the one of racial conflicts, Vietnam war, and the revolts in France and in the communist bloc. These were rough times, so the situation couldn’t have been better: the young ferment became active and decided to put their ideas about life into life.

And among all these things happening there was the Woodstock Festival, an event which was just supposed to be a review of the musical heritage of the 60’s. The history, however, took everyone by surprise, and transformed this simple musical festival into a real legend. The festival started a chain of events, all connected with the fact that almost 400 thousand young people arrived at one place to listen to music, to break social customs, and to attract the attention of the media from all over the world.

The investments that had to be made to organize the event, such as renting the stage and the sound system or reserving fees for the bands, were huge. At one point, it seemed that the festival will be a total financial disaster; that the organizers will have to face bankruptcy and deal with a crowd of angry creditors. But luckily for the history of rock’n’roll, nothing could put off these incorrigible dreamers. They showed great resolution and went on to create a festival which was later on called the most beautiful and the most important one in the whole world.

Micheal Lang, one of the creators of Woodstock, hit upon another idea in the year 1994. After 25 years he wanted to make a remake of Woodstock 69. In short, we could say it was a good party –professionally organized, with a crowd of some hundred thousand people, featuring a number of stars – but there were also a tight fence around the festival field and the tickets cost somewhat more – 39 dollars.

Five years later Michael Lang went for the second comeback to Woodstock and another trip to the past is being planned this year. This time the idea is very clever. Why? Michael Lang invites everyone to an intercontinental concert, which will be organized in August to celebrate the 40-year-long history of this incredible event. The first concert is supposed to take place at Tempelhof, an old airport in Berlin, and the second one a little later somewhere around New York City. About 200 thousand people are expected to show up.

Our Przystanek Woodstock, which has been organized in Poland for 14 years alreay has so much in common with Lang’s Festival!! And this is where we come to the nub of the matter:

We would like to invite you to the 15th Przystanek Woodstock Festival in Kostrzyn on the Oder between July 31st and August 2nd 2009!

As usual, the bands will perform on two stages – a big one, and a folk one. There will be artists from all around the world; you will be able to visit the stands of various NGOs and take part in of the discussions held in the Academy of the Most Beautiful Arts. As it has always been, the WOŚP Foundation will thank all good people for the 17th Great Finale by organizing the concert for free, though of course with the help of our guests. About 1000 members of our Peace Patrol will be ensuring safety, and I will be keeping a sharp eye on it all from the stage.

It’s the 15th time now! I want to express my tribute to Michael Lang. He enabled my friends and me, as well as our camera crew, to see the Woodstock 1994 in person. If it wasn’t for that experience, I wouldn’t have been able to come up with the most important idea: why not organize something like this at home? As you can see, this plan was put into life and one of the reasons for its success was that all the values of Woodstock 1969 are still close to my heart.

Przystanek Woodstock is alive and is doing well! And we are still working and fighting with our swashbuckling confidence because we want people to do great deeds both in winter and in summer.

We’re doing all we can to make Michael understand our Woodstock idea. Perhaps we could connect the Berlin event with our concert in Kostrzyn and all these things that has worked well for many years here, in Poland? But even without that we will remember: the idea of Woodstock has 40 years, and we will go back to it again.

Become a part of it! Discuss with us, visit our websites, co-create Przystanek Woodstock. Let’s applaud the artists, let’s respect each other. Come and help us, Friends, and let’s get down to work!

Now is the moment. We have just officially started off with the 15th Przystanek Woodstock Festival!

Siema!!!
Jurek Owsiak