Glastonbury Music Festival

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The Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts

Did you know that The Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts is the famous festival's correct name? Maybe you didn't realise that it's not actually held in Glastonbury but on a farm in the small village of Pilton, about a mile south of the town.

It began in the 1970s as a reflection of the times of hippies, love and free music festivals. I guess founder Michael Eavis must be amazed how it's grown in size and importance since then. It is now the biggest green field music festival in the world.

The Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury Music Festival
Picture from Wikipedia and in the Public Domain.
Glastonbury 2010 opens its gates on Wednesday 23rd June and finishes on Sunday 27th June.

You must register to buy tickets which you do on the Glastonbury Festival Registration page.

(Glastonbury Music Festival is June 23, 2010)

Glastonbury Music Festival 2009  

Friday, June 26
The Glastonbury Music Festival opened today, Friday 26th June, with the news of Michael Jackson's death coming in overnight - a big shock to festival goers many of whom held an overnight vigil for him.

People started arriving and setting up their tents on the festival site on Wednesday. They enjoyed two days of beautiful hot, sunny weather until yesterday evening when the region has had thunderstorms.

Glastonbury Festival News

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Glastonbury - In the Beginning 

A Muddy Glastonbury in 2007
Copyright © Vintagekits - Creative Commons License

The Festival was started by local farmer Michael Eavis and the first one, lasting two days, was held the day after the death of Jimi Hendrix in September 1970.

That first event attracted 1500 people who were charged £1 each and that included milk from the farm. The headline acts were Marc Bolan, Keith Christmas, Stackridge and Al Stewart.

The following year it was transferred to the time of the Summer Solstice in June and was called the Glastonbury Fayre. Since 1971, it has always been held at the Summer Solstice. The 1971 event was free to enter and attracted around 12,000 people. It starred Hawkwind, Traffic, Melanie, David Bowie, Joan Baez and Fairport Convention.

In 1979 Bill Harkin and Arabella Churchill persuaded Michael Eavis to hold another festival with the theme of the Year of the Child which devoted a special area to the idea - Children's World. This was the birth of the Children's World Charity. Although admission charge was now £5 per person and around 12,000 attended the three day event, the Festival lost money. As the finance for that year's event was raised by a loan secured on Worthy Farm, Michael Eavis didn't hold the Festival in 1980.

New Order Playing at Glastonbury in 1981 

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The Festival from 1981 to the Present Day 

After losing money in 1979, Michael Eavis could not risk his farm in the future and was determined to run the Festival on a sounder financial footing. He came to an agreement with CND (Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament) that funds raised at the 1981 Glastonbury Festival would benefit the local branch of CND and, in return, the national office would send out promotional material to their members and handle ticket sales.

It was in 1981 that the famous Pyramid Stage was built (a temporary one had been constructed right back in 1970). During the rest of the year, it's used for cattle and for animal food storage.

Since then, the Festival has had to be licensed by the local authorities. It has had problems with objections from local people. There have been problems with security and thefts, drugs and the kind of problems a large scale event like this might expect. However, the management have coped with everything, adapting and improving their systems and security. This has included building a secure, unclimbable steel wall all the way round the site and improved security staff to stop people entering the site without tickets. They have also improved their system of ticketing to avoid ticket touts reselling and to stop people entering on forged tickets.

Now, it's not worth even considering trying to enter the Glastonbury Music Festival unless you have a legitimate, valid ticket.

Picture above: Worthy Farm (the site of Glastonbury Festival) at the beginning of the 1983 Festival with only a few tents already on site.

Picture from Wikipedia and in the Public Domain.

 

This is an IMPORT LP vinyl disc
Glastonbury Fayre Festival

Glastonbury Fayre Festival

Track Listings
1. Dark Star...Bury - Grateful Dead
2. Love Song - Brinsley Schwarz
3. Blanket My Muesli - Mighty Baby
4. Sunken Rags - Marc Bolan
5. Classified - Pete Townshend
6. Superman - David Bowie
7. Silver Machine and Welcome - Hawkwind
8. Sun Music - Skin Alley
9. Glad Stoned Buried Fielding Flash and Fresh Fest Footprint in My Memory - Daevid Allen, Gong
10. Do It - The Pink Fairies
11. Uncle Harry's Last Freak-Out - The Pink Fairies
12. Out Demons Out - Edgar Broughton Band

20 Years of the Glastonbury Festival 

A montage of photographs taken at the Glastonbury Music Festival from 1982 to 2002.
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Glastonbury Festival and Charities 

Michael Eavis and the other organisers are enthusiastic about supporting charities and raise money at every festival for a number of charities.

The main charities represented at the Glastonbury Festival are Oxfam, WaterAid and Greenpeace.

Oxfam
Oxfam sends 1700 stewards to the Festival to help visitors get in, get out, find their tents and much else. They also have their shop where you can buy useful things like wellington (rubber) boots - you might need them if it rains - and blankets. You can buy many other things too. During the last 15 years, Oxfam has raised over £2 million here.

WaterAid
The toilet facilities (see picture) are one of the most important facilities at the Festival and WaterAid provide VIP latrines and She Pees, popular at previous Festivals and manned by WaterAid volunteers. Of course, they also campaign to increase awareness of the water poverty found in many places in the world and to get people to sign petitions and contact the Government and Members of Parliament to take action to alleviate it.

Greenpeace
In 2008 the Greenpeace meadow at the Glastonbury Festival was a surprise. Greenpeace said "...as always it will be thrilling, fruity and ready to challenge your ideas about what we're doing to our planet."

They emphasize the Glastonbury motto, 'Love the farm and leave no trace' pointing out that this should always be the motto for all of us if we want to care for our planet.

Picture above: Toilets at Glastonbury
Copyright © Greg75 - Creative Commons License

 

The Greenpeace to Amchitka: An Environmental Odyssey

The Greenpeace to Amchitka: An Environmental Odyssey

by: Robert Hunter

Amazon Price: $19.95 (as of 12/06/2009)Buy Now

This is the story of the birth of Greenpeace, told by the official chronicler and illustrated by the official photographer. Thirty years later, are you ready to hear the truth?

Glastonbury Festival 2007 - Music, Rain and Mud 

2007 was one of the years when it poured with rain during the Festival. You can see the area where people pitched their tents has turned into a quagmire. In parts of this video, you can see people wading through mud - the experienced festival-goers brought their wellies (rubber boots) and waterproofs!
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A Green Festival 

Glastonbury Festival's Green Police
Copyright © pand0ra23 - Creative Commons License


The organisers of the Glastonbury Festival work hard to minimise the environmental impact of the event. They implement a whole host of measures to achieve this. All 15,000 bins on the site are clearly labelled so that as much as possible can be recycled. They say that they recycle about 50% of all the rubbish on the site. They use biodiesel, recycled oil, solar and wind energy for power and traders are encouraged to use paper rather than plastic bags and low energy light bulbs.

The organisers give out a set of tent pegs to everybody who is going to camp on the site. These are wood not metal and, if they are left behind, they rot in the ground after a few weeks so not injuring the farm's cattle.

They also have 'Green Police' to encourage festival goers to respect the environment. Amongst their duties, they are on the look-out for anyone not using the public toilets. Their motto is "Don't pee just anywhere, the ground really can't take it."

The Green Police wear comic outfits to soften their message.

Remembering Woodstock 

Remembering Woodstock (Ashgate Popular and Folk Music) (Ashgate Popular and Folk Music)

Remembering Woodstock (Ashgate Popular and Folk Music) (Ashgate Popular and Folk Music)

Amazon Price: $26.95 (as of 12/06/2009)Buy Now

The Woodstock festival of 1969, featured such groups and artists as the Who, Country Joe and the Fish, Ten Years After, Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix. It is remembered as much for its 'bringing together' of the counter-cultural generation as for the music performed. Since then, Woodstock has become the subject of many books, magazine articles and documentaries which have served to mythologise the event in the public imagination.

This wide ranging book brings together a number of established and new writers in the fields of sociology, media studies and popular music studies. Each of the five chapters focus on a specific aspect of the Woodstock festival and its continuing significance in relation to the music industry, the rock festival 'tradition', sixties nostalgia and the cultural impact of popular music.

Glastonbury Festival 2008 

People started arriving for the Festival two days early, on the Wednesday evening with more arriving on Thursday. On Friday Michael Eavis opened the Glastonbury Festival waving a wellie (wellington boot) saying "We don't need welly boots this year. No welly boots and no umbrellas!" Apart from a few light showers, there was no repeat of the previous year's deluge, when it rained so much and so hard that Worthy Farm's fields looked like a sea of mud.

There was concern on Thursday when thick smoke appeared above the Festival but it was a big fire at a car scrapyard about a mile from Worthy Farm. Unfortunately, the emergency vehicles, police, fire brigade and ambulances, and the closure of the A37, caused huge traffic jams, made worse by heavier traffic than usual with festival goers on their way.

The choice of a hip hop headliner, Jay-Z, caused a lot of controversy but his performance was a triumph and greeted by a large audience with enthusiasm. His record company are now reporting that after the weekend, sales of his album increased five-fold.

Amy Winehouse was a great success in front of an 80,000 strong audience. She got off the stage and sang to the fans behind the barriers. Unfortunately, somebody in the audience took the opportunity to touch her - reports vary from a 'grope' to hair pulling. Whatever the provacation, Amy Winehouse was seen singing while attempting to hit somebody in the crowd.

On Sunday, the crowd enjoyed two golden oldies, Leonard Cohen and Neil Diamond both of whom performed their best known songs to great applause and cheers.

There was some gleeful reporting before the Festival that this was the first time the tickets had to fail to sell out but Michael Eavis was able to report that tickets had indeed sold out and the Festival, contrary to reports, would not face a loss.

Picture above: Entertainers at Glastonbury
Copyright © Guy Taylor - Creative Commons License

Leonard Cohen Singing 'Hallelujah' at Glastonbury 2008 

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More about Glastonbury 

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Glastonbury 2008 - Amy Winehouse 

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Visit the Glastonbury Festival Website 

If you want more detailed information, visit the official Glastonbury Festival Site.

Please Give Generously 

Just like the Glastonbury Festival, I like to promote looking after the environment so please consider making a donation to Earthjustice.

Environmental law defender Earthjustice, the top American ecological law firm, because the earth needs a good lawyer. Formerly Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund.

We at Squidoo passionately believe in creating new ways to support good causes online. By making a donation to Earthjustice from this page, you are sending money directly to that organization, in whatever amount you want. We don't touch it. We don't even see it. The author of this page doesn't either. And if you made it this far, thanks for caring.

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