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August 30th and 31st

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Isle of Wight

(Mini Doc French)

Isle of Wight Festival

The stage under construction for the 2007 festival
Location(s)	Seaclose Park, Isle of Wight, UK
Years active	1968-1970 / 2002-Present
Date(s)	At the beginning of June
Genre	Rock, Alternative rock
Website	www.isleofwightfestival.com

The Isle of Wight Festival (NOT to be confused with The I Love Lucy Festival) is a music festival which takes place every year on the Isle of Wight in the UK. It was originally held from 1968 to 1970.

The 1969 Isle of Wight Festival was held on August 30 - August 31, 1969, at Wootton, and attracted an audience of approximately 150,000 to see the acts of Bob Dylan, The Who and Free. It was the second of three music festivals held on the Isle of Wight between 1968 and 1970. It was believed to be a well managed and relatively trouble free event, unlike the 1970 festival.

August 30th and 31st 1969

Part of the 1969 crowd down front of stage . Note picket fence , but no sign of a shrubbery .....

The comparative low key feel of the 1969 festival can be seen in this pic of Marsha Hunt onstage

The 1969 Isle of Wight Festival was a far more ambitious affair than than the previous years bash , which only had the Airplane as the overseas headliner and not a lot of other big names to back them up. The 69 line-up was far more heavyweight . With the BIG Z as the drawcard , none other than Bob Dylan himself , and bands like The Who and The Band taking support roles , this festival was guaranteed to draw many more punters than the earlier festival.

These pages contain parts of the program , articles , photos and information regarding recordings , performances and set lists where they are available. We are always looking for more first hand accounts as well as new archive material, particularly photographs taken by audience members.

The festival was so much larger and more popular than the year before due to the performance of Bob Dylan. He was reluctant to perform his comeback show on this unknown island until the promoters showed him a short video of the Island's cultural and literary heritage. This appealed to Dylan's artistic sensibilities as he was enthusiastic about performing in Tennyson country. Prior to the festival Bob Dylan and The Band rehearsed at Forelands Farm in Bembridge, and were joined by The Beatles minus Paul McCartney. Among the 150,000 audience members were John Lennon with Yoko Ono, Ringo Starr, George Harrison, Rolling Stones Keith Richards and Bill Wyman, Syd Barrett, Eric Clapton, Elton John and Jane Fonda.

These original events were promoted and organised by the Foulk brothers (Ron, Ray and Bill Foulk) under the banner of their company Fiery Creations Limited. The venues were Ford Farm (near Godshill), Wootton and Afton Down (near Freshwater) respectively. The 1969 event was notable for the appearance of Bob Dylan and The Band. This was Dylan's first paid performance since his motor cycle accident some two years earlier, and was held at a time when many still wondered if he would ever perform again. Followers from across the world trecked to the Isle of Wight for what seemed like a 'second coming'. Estimates of 150,000 - 250,000 attended. The 1969 festival opened on Friday 29 August - eleven days after the close of Woodstock. Dylan was living in Woodstock, New York, at the time and it was widely believed that he would perform there, after the event had been "put in his own backyard". As it happened, Dylan left for the Isle of Wight on 15 August - the day the Woodstock festival began.

The 1970 event was by far the largest and most famous of these early festivals; indeed it was said at the time to be one of the largest human gatherings in the world, with estimates of over 600,000, surpassing the attendance at Woodstock. Included in the line-up of over fifty performers were The Who, Jimi Hendrix, Miles Davis, The Doors, Ten Years After, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Joni Mitchell, The Moody Blues, Melanie, Donovan, Free, Chicago, Richie Havens, John Sebastian, Leonard Cohen, Jethro Tull, Taste and Tiny Tim. The unexpectedly high attendance levels led, in 1971, to Parliament passing the "Isle of Wight Act" preventing gatherings of more than 5,000 people on the island without a special licence.

The 1970 festival was filmed by a 35mm film crew under the direction of future Academy Award-winning director Murray Lerner who at that point had just directed the Academy Award-nominated documentary Festival of the Newport Folk Festival. Ownership of the footage passed to Lerner after the Foulk brothers defaulted on paying the filmmakers. Lerner distilled material from the festival into the film A Message to Love: The Isle of Wight Rock Festival released theatrically in 1996 and subsequently on DVD. In addition to this film, Lerner has created full-length films focused on performances by individual artists at the 1970 festival. To date there have been individual films of The Who, Jimi Hendrix, Miles Davis, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, The Moody Blues, Free, Leonard Cohen and Jethro Tull.

The event was revived in 2002 at Seaclose Park, a recreation ground on the outskirts of Newport. It has been held annually since that year, progressively extending itself northwards beyond Seaclose Park along the fields of the eastern Medina valley. Many notable artists have performed since its revival including The Rolling Stones, Muse, Stereophonics, Donovan, Ray Davies, Robert Plant, David Bowie, Manic Street Preachers, The Who, R.E.M., Coldplay, The Proclaimers, Bryan Adams and The Police. It was sponsored by Nokia from 2004 to 2006. The promoters of the event now are Solo Music Agency and promotions. Apart from being held on the Isle of Wight, and featuring the now customary artwork of Dave Roe, there is no connection with the festivals of 1968–1970.

Original Festival details

1968

Held 31 August 1968.
Attendance - 10,000 (approx)
Site - Ford farm, near Godshill.
Headline Acts - Jefferson Airplane
Other Acts - Arthur Brown, The Move, Tyrannosaurus Rex, Plastic Penny and Pretty Things.

1969

Isle of Wight Festival 1969

This took place on 30 and 31 August 1969 at Wootton, with an estimated attendance of 300,000. The line up included Bob Dylan, The Nice, Pretty Things, The Who and The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band.

1970

This event was held between 26 and 30 August 1970 at Afton Down; attendance has been estimated at roughly 600,000. Arguably the best-remembered of the early versions of the IW festivals, due to its lineup, attendance and news coverage. The line up included Jimi Hendrix, Ten Years After, Chicago, The Doors, The Who, Joan Baez, Free, and Miles Davis.

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