The Road to Woodstock

The Road to Woodstock isn't just about a traffic jam on the New York State Thruway.

It's also the story of Michael Lang and the path that took him from co-producing a small-time concert at a racetrack in Hallandale, Fla., to helping to pull off the Woodstock Music and Art Fair, the legendary concert event of the 20th century.

For the Woodstock-challenged, Lang's book is invaluable. It takes us back to the community's roots as a 17th-century Dutch settlement, its evolution into an artists colony at the turn of the 20th century and its becoming, in the summer of 1969, a cultural touchstone for multiple generations.

Lang lays out what went on behind the scenes of the festival that drew the likes of Janis Joplin, The Who and the Grateful Dead. He packs his story with the planning logistics: finding cash to jump-start the project, booking acts, arranging for concessions, security, ticket sales and garbage removal, and a host of other tasks.

Lang neatly wraps up his cinematic reminiscing by taking a seminal thread from Woodstock's history —Jimi Hendrix's breathtaking interpretation of The Star Spangled Banner— and linking its poignancy to what some have called the 21st-century Woodstock moment: the day Barack Obama became the first black president.

Back to the Garden

Just two weeks before Woodstock, Pete Fornatale was enjoying his first gig as a disc jockey with WNEW-FM in New York. The job is forever linked to his Woodstock memories because 20 minutes into his debut program, Fornatale did a live commercial for the musical event.

That was Fornatale's seminal Woodstock moment. And while he uses it to kick off Back to the Garden, his take on the festival's social and cultural influence, he makes sure plenty of other Woodstock witnesses and performers share their memories, too. More than 100 firsthand accounts flesh out his narrative.

Contributors include star musicians Richie Havens, Stephen Stills and Sly Stone as well as Max Yasgur, who owned the farm where the culture- and mind-altering event took place. Also weighing in are audience member Harriet Schwartz, rock historian Arthur Levy and Rolling Stone magazine founder Jann Wenner.

Fornatale also mines decades of personal interviews with the rock royalty who played the three-day event.

Fornatale's docu-memoir is not as optimally organized as Lang's, but it's packed with fascinating inside information that makes it just as valuable an addition to the Woodstock encyclopedia.