Celebration at Big Sur
Encyclopedia
Celebration at Big Sur is a film of the 1969 Big Sur Folk Festival in Big Sur, California
, featuring Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young
(CSNY), Joan Baez
, Joni Mitchell
and others.
Released in 1971, the film was directed by Baird Bryant
and Johanna Demetrakas. A young Gary Weis
was among the cinematographers; other members of the camera and sound crew also went on to become famous in their fields, including Peter Smokler, Peter Pilafian, and Joan Churchill.
As of 2010, the film has never been officially released in any home video format (such as DVD
or VHS
).
The festival, one in an annual series of concerts held on the grounds of the Esalen Institute
in Big Sur from 1964 to 1971, was held on the weekend of September 13-14, 1969, only one month after the famous and considerably larger Woodstock Music & Art Fair
, which is referred to repeatedly. Celebration at Big Sur did not receive the same critical acclaim as the 1970 Woodstock
film.
, which the audience faces. Musical performances dominate the film, with footage of surrounding occurrences interspersed and montaged into the music sequences.
, who had recently appeared at Woodstock with Crosby, Stills & Nash, but refused to be filmed. Here, fortified by session drummer Dallas Taylor
and Motown bassist Greg Reeves
, CSNY perform Young's "Sea of Madness" and "Down by the River
". Perhaps the film's most famous scene is an altercation between Stephen Stills
and a heckler
.
" prior to any album release, first attempting to teach the audience to sing the melodically complicated refrain. Ironically, Mitchell would later develop a well-known distaste for festival gigs, but in this performance her enthusiasm is evident. Mitchell talks about having spotted whales off the coast, and is generally seen with then-boyfriend Graham Nash
of CSNY. She also sings "Get Together" with members of Crosby, Stills & Nash in a seemingly impromptu jam.
Although Mitchell had made earlier televised appearances, this may be her earliest filmed performance.
workshop at Esalen in 1965 helped attract pop/rock acts later to the festival. She is featured prominently throughout the film. Celebration begins with Baez opening the festival with Bob Dylan
's "I Shall Be Released
" and closes with her leading a large crowd in singing "Oh Happy Day
" in the event's finale. She also sings two of her own compositions, "A Song for David" and "Sweet Sir Galahad
", during the course of the film.
, Dorothy Combs Morrison
and The Combs Sisters, Mimi Fariña
, Carol Ann Cisneros, Julie Payne, Chris Ethridge
and The Struggle Mountain Resistance Band.
While Ruthann Friedman
, The Flying Burrito Brothers
and The Incredible String Band performed at this event, they do not appear in the film.
In the opening scene the filmmakers attempt to interview local patrol police, but fail to get permission.
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
, featuring Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young
Crosby, Stills & Nash (and Young)
Crosby, Stills & Nash is a folk rock supergroup made up of David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash, also known as Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young when joined by occasional fourth member Neil Young...
(CSNY), Joan Baez
Joan Baez
Joan Chandos Baez is an American folk singer, songwriter, musician and a prominent activist in the fields of human rights, peace and environmental justice....
, Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell, CC is a Canadian musician, singer songwriter, and painter. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in her native Saskatchewan and Western Canada and then busking in the streets and dives of Toronto...
and others.
Released in 1971, the film was directed by Baird Bryant
Baird Bryant
Wenzell Baird Bryant was an American filmmaker. He is best known as the cameraman on the Albert Maysles film Gimme Shelter who filmed the fatal stabbing of Rolling Stones concertgoer Meredith Hunter by Hells Angel Alan Passaro at the Altamont Free Concert in December 1969.As a cinematographer,...
and Johanna Demetrakas. A young Gary Weis
Gary Weis
Gary Weis is a movie and television director. He was the second creator of short films for Saturday Night Live .-Selected Filmography:*Jimi Hendrix *Saturday Night Live...
was among the cinematographers; other members of the camera and sound crew also went on to become famous in their fields, including Peter Smokler, Peter Pilafian, and Joan Churchill.
As of 2010, the film has never been officially released in any home video format (such as DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
or VHS
VHS
The Video Home System is a consumer-level analog recording videocassette standard developed by Victor Company of Japan ....
).
The festival, one in an annual series of concerts held on the grounds of the Esalen Institute
Esalen Institute
Esalen Institute is a residential community and retreat in Big Sur, California, which focuses upon humanistic alternative education. Esalen is a nonprofit organization devoted to activites such as meditation, massage, Gestalt, yoga, psychology, ecology, and spirituality...
in Big Sur from 1964 to 1971, was held on the weekend of September 13-14, 1969, only one month after the famous and considerably larger Woodstock Music & Art Fair
Woodstock Festival
Woodstock Music & Art Fair was a music festival, billed as "An Aquarian Exposition: 3 Days of Peace & Music". It was held at Max Yasgur's 600-acre dairy farm in the Catskills near the hamlet of White Lake in the town of Bethel, New York, from August 15 to August 18, 1969...
, which is referred to repeatedly. Celebration at Big Sur did not receive the same critical acclaim as the 1970 Woodstock
Woodstock (film)
Woodstock is a 1970 American documentary on the Woodstock Festival that took place in August 1969 at Bethel in New York. Entertainment Weekly called this film the benchmark of concert movies and one of the most entertaining documentaries ever made...
film.
Performances
The concert occurs on a low stage by the Pacific OceanPacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.At 165.2 million square kilometres in area, this largest division of the World...
, which the audience faces. Musical performances dominate the film, with footage of surrounding occurrences interspersed and montaged into the music sequences.
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
The film includes early footage of Neil YoungNeil Young
Neil Percival Young, OC, OM is a Canadian singer-songwriter who is widely regarded as one of the most influential musicians of his generation...
, who had recently appeared at Woodstock with Crosby, Stills & Nash, but refused to be filmed. Here, fortified by session drummer Dallas Taylor
Dallas Taylor (drummer)
Dallas Woodrow Taylor Jr. was born in Denver, Colorado, 7 April 1948. He is a session drummer who has played on several rock records of the 1960s and 1970s...
and Motown bassist Greg Reeves
Greg Reeves
Greg Reeves is an American musician. He is best known for playing bass on Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young's Déjà Vu album in 1969.-Biography and career:...
, CSNY perform Young's "Sea of Madness" and "Down by the River
Down by the River
"Down by the River" is a song composed by Neil Young. It was first released on his 1969 album with Crazy Horse, Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere. Young explained the context of story when introducing it in New Orleans on September 27, 1984. It depicts a man who catches his woman cheating on him,...
". Perhaps the film's most famous scene is an altercation between Stephen Stills
Stephen Stills
Stephen Arthur Stills is an American guitarist and singer/songwriter best known for his work with Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills & Nash . He has performed on a professional level in several other bands as well as maintaining a solo career at the same time...
and a heckler
Heckler
A heckler is a person who harass and try to disconcert others with questions, challenges, or gibes.Hecklers are often known to shout disparaging comments at a performance or event, or interrupts set-piece speeches, for example at a political meeting, with intent to disturb its performers or...
.
Joni Mitchell
Mitchell, who did not appear at the Woodstock Festival, performs the song "WoodstockWoodstock (song)
"Woodstock" is a song about the Woodstock Music and Art Festival of 1969.Joni Mitchell wrote the song from what she had heard from then-boyfriend, Graham Nash, about the festival. She had not been there herself, since she was told it would be more advantageous to appear on The Dick Cavett Show by...
" prior to any album release, first attempting to teach the audience to sing the melodically complicated refrain. Ironically, Mitchell would later develop a well-known distaste for festival gigs, but in this performance her enthusiasm is evident. Mitchell talks about having spotted whales off the coast, and is generally seen with then-boyfriend Graham Nash
Graham Nash
Graham William Nash, OBE is an English singer-songwriter known for his light tenor vocals and for his songwriting contributions with the British pop group The Hollies, and with the folk-rock band Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Nash is a photography collector and a published photographer...
of CSNY. She also sings "Get Together" with members of Crosby, Stills & Nash in a seemingly impromptu jam.
Although Mitchell had made earlier televised appearances, this may be her earliest filmed performance.
Joan Baez
Baez was a Big Sur-festival regular whose folk-musicFolk music
Folk music is an English term encompassing both traditional folk music and contemporary folk music. The term originated in the 19th century. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted by mouth, as music of the lower classes, and as music with unknown composers....
workshop at Esalen in 1965 helped attract pop/rock acts later to the festival. She is featured prominently throughout the film. Celebration begins with Baez opening the festival with Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
's "I Shall Be Released
I Shall Be Released
"I Shall Be Released" is a 1967 song written by Bob Dylan.The Band played it on their debut album, Music from Big Pink , with Richard Manuel singing lead vocals, and Rick Danko and Levon Helm harmonizing in the chorus...
" and closes with her leading a large crowd in singing "Oh Happy Day
Oh Happy Day
"Oh Happy Day" is a 1967 gospel music arrangement of an 18th century hymn. Recorded by the Edwin Hawkins Singers, it became an international hit in 1969, reaching US #4 and UK #2 on the pop charts...
" in the event's finale. She also sings two of her own compositions, "A Song for David" and "Sweet Sir Galahad
Sweet Sir Galahad
"Sweet Sir Galahad" is a song written by Joan Baez that she performed at the Woodstock Festival in August 1969. She first performed it on Season 3, Episode 23, of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour earlier that year and included it on her album One Day at a Time...
", during the course of the film.
Others
In addition to CSNY, Baez and Mitchell, other performers featured in Celebration included John SebastianJohn Sebastian
John Benson Sebastian Jr. is an American singer, songwriter, guitarist and autoharpist. He is best known as a founder of The Lovin' Spoonful, a band inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000...
, Dorothy Combs Morrison
Dorothy Combs Morrison
Dorothy Combs Morrison in an American gospel music singer. She was born in Longview, Texas, on May 8, 1945. The seventh child of ten, Dorothy showed early signs of her talents. She began singing at the age of 13 and released her first single "I Am Free", while singing with her siblings as 'The...
and The Combs Sisters, Mimi Fariña
Mimi Fariña
Mimi Baez Fariña was a singer-songwriter and activist, the youngest of three daughters to a Scottish mother and Mexican-American physicist Albert Baez .- Early years:Fariña's father, a physicist affiliated with Stanford University and MIT, moved his family...
, Carol Ann Cisneros, Julie Payne, Chris Ethridge
Chris Ethridge
Chris Ethridge is an American country rock bass guitarist. He was a member of the International Submarine Band and The Flying Burrito Brothers, and co-wrote several songs with Gram Parsons.-Career:...
and The Struggle Mountain Resistance Band.
While Ruthann Friedman
Ruthann Friedman
Ruthann Friedman is an American folk singer.Born in the Bronx, New York, Friedman spent her formative years in the San Fernando Valley, north of Los Angeles. She started playing guitar at the age of eight while listening to Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger and Josh White. Her first song gained her a...
, The Flying Burrito Brothers
The Flying Burrito Brothers
The Flying Burrito Brothers was an early country rock band, best known for its influential debut album,The Gilded Palace of Sin . Although the group is most often mentioned in connection with country rock legends Gram Parsons and Chris Hillman, the group underwent many personnel changes.-Original...
and The Incredible String Band performed at this event, they do not appear in the film.
In the opening scene the filmmakers attempt to interview local patrol police, but fail to get permission.
Songs performed
- "I Shall Be Released" – Baez
- "Mobile Line" – Sebastian with Stills
- offstage
- "Song for David" – Baez
- shown rehearsing offstage, with stage performance of same song cut in
- "All of God's Children Got Soul" – Morrison and the Combs Sisters
- "Sea of Madness" – CSNY
- "4 + 20" – Stills solo performance
- Stills introduces this number discussing his interaction with a heckler in the previous scene
- "Get Together" – Mitchell with Crosby, Stills & Nash and Sebastian
- "Put a Little Love in Your HeartPut a Little Love in Your Heart"Put a Little Love in Your Heart" is a song originally performed in 1968 by Jackie DeShannon, who composed it with her brother, Randy Myers, and Jimmy Holiday. In the USA, it was DeShannon's highest-charting hit, reaching #4 on the Hot 100 and #2 on the Adult Contemporary charts...
" – Morrison and the Combs Sisters- incomplete
- non-musical footage of nude sauna, audience happenings
- "Swing Down Sweet Chariot" – various
- offstage, incomplete
- "Rainbows All Over Yours Blues" – Sebastian
- "Woodstock" – Mitchell
- non-musical footage of self-identified "freak" with Woodstock-themed bus
- "Red-Eye Express" – Sebastian with Stills
- "Changes" – Fariña and Payne with Stills
- incomplete
- "Malagueña Salerosa" – Cisneros
- "Rise, Shine, and Give God the Glory" – The Struggle Mountain Resistance Band
- incomplete
- "Down By the River" – CSNY
- incomplete, over 7 minutes
- folk musician improvising outside the festival
- "Sweet Sir GalahadSweet Sir Galahad"Sweet Sir Galahad" is a song written by Joan Baez that she performed at the Woodstock Festival in August 1969. She first performed it on Season 3, Episode 23, of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour earlier that year and included it on her album One Day at a Time...
" – Baez - "Oh Happy Day" – Morrison and the Combs Sisters with Baez
- opens with Baez rehearsing same number with Morrison
External links
- Big Sur Lobby Cards
- [ Big Sur Folk Festival September '69] – AMG review of a bootleg of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young's performance