Love It: Everyone quoted in the story sounds like they’re still trippin’!
Mariann Wizard / The Rag Blog
Iconic Woodstock Couple Keeps Festival Spirit Alive
By Adam Horne / July 11, 2009
Forty years after the legendary festival in Bethel, N.Y., a photo of two lovebirds taken at Woodstock has become an iconic symbol of love. Having only met three months prior, the picture captures a young couple — Nick and Bobbi Ercoline, both now 60 — embracing underneath a dirty blanket, surrounded by exhausted concertgoers. To the Ercolines’ surprise, the image became the cover of the ‘Woodstock’ album in 1970 and was featured on posters for the subsequent documentary film.
What resonates most about the photo is that it speaks to what many Woodstock veterans consider to be the true meaning of the festival — not just music but a movement of peace, love and unity. In a recent interview with Spinner, Woodstock performer Richie Havens cited a Martin Luther King Jr. speech, saying “It’s not him or him or him, it’s all of us or nothing. That was our thing, that’s what we went against the war with.”
The couple themselves acknowledge the social significance of the now legendary picture. “It’s an honest representation of a generation. When we look at that photo … I see our generation,” Nick told the NY Daily News.
Original Santana percussionist Michael Carabello witnessed firsthand how his generation came together for three days in 1969. “It was about the music and it was about everything else, but it was more about us getting along.” Noting the hectic and exhausting nature of the festival (as evidenced by the background of the photo), Carabello told Spinner, “You know, you get so absorbed in it you just don’t want to hear it anymore, you forget about it, so the only thing you can do is become a family. You just help one another out.”
Certainly Woodstock has been romanticized over the years, but for many, the image of Nick and Bobbi wrapped in a blanket represents exactly what Carabello is talking about.
What’s more, the couple has been together ever since.
Source / Spinner
Woodstock was a special event and it took place in a year that was filled with special events. I went to Woodstock, located only about 15 miles from the place where I spent my entire childhood, with a bunch of New Left media types from Liberation News Service and Rat (NY City underground paper). Our plan was to distribute lots of anti-war literature to the gathered hippies, bringing them a political message. GUess what? They were not very interested. They were interested in the music and the “scene” and not the overt politics that we exempified. In retrospect, it was poor judgment on our part to go as missionaries. We should have gone as freaks with good quality drugs, good food, and the desire to hear music and have some fun. When it got rainy, then muddy, given how discouraged we were about our failed political mission, I encouraged our little LNS group to leave and I took them to one of my favorite childhood haunts, a beautiful waterfall where we went skinny-dipping. I saw the director’s cut of the movie “Woodstock” recently, and I loved it. So much excellent music. The movie won an academy award for best documentary, but one thing I noticed is that the people who made the movie were rather clueless. Just as we were! My cousin Gabby Parsons, from radio station WMMM in Madison, Wisc., also spent her entire childhood in this region, and she’s a major Woodstock fan and plans to attend some kind of event on the site in August. I consider her my envoy to that event.
Note: the comment was removed because it was an accidental duplicate of Allen’s original comment.
Thorne
Beautiful, special times that only those who lived through them can really understand.Are we all nostalgic for those times, the caring, the optimism, the hope?
Win a Woodstock special edition Stratocaster and Collector’s Edition Woodstock DVD and listen to RADIO WOODSTOCK 69 which features only music from the original Woodstock era (1967-1971) and RADIO WOODSTOCK with music from the original Woodstock era to today’s artists who reflect the spirit of Woodstock. Go to http://www.woodstockuniverse.com for details.
Peace, love, music,
RFWoodstock
rfwoodstock@gmail.com