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Richie Havens, the great Greenwich Village
folksinger who shot to prominence in 1969 as one of the hits of the Woodstock
Festival – and the documentary film about it – died suddenly on Monday at age
72 after suffering a heart attack.
I didn’t know Richie that well, but always
enjoyed and appreciated the brief times I spent in his company and in his
audience.
When Richie was in Montreal in 1998 for a concert,
I did a long interview with him in the afternoon before sound check for later
broadcast on the Folk Roots/Folk Branches radio program.
We were sitting around the green room in between interview and sound check and I mentioned to Richie that Bruce Murdoch was a good friend of mine. Bruce – who by then was about 18 years into a 25 year hiatus from songwriting and performing – had had his first full-length LP, 33 1/3 Revolutions per Minute, produced by Richie. We got to talking about Bruce and Richie played a couple of lines from “Let’s Lay Down Our Drums,” one of Bruce’s songs from that 1971 LP during the sound check. He said it was a song he always meant to learn.
A few hours later, Richie did a beautiful version of the complete song during the concert.
In 2003, Richie played the Champlain Valley Folk Festival in Vermont where I was a main stage MC. We were chatting backstage and I thanked him for doing that Bruce Murdoch song in Montreal. Richie thanked me for reminding him of Bruce and his songs and that he felt compelled to work up the song after our chat.
We were sitting around the green room in between interview and sound check and I mentioned to Richie that Bruce Murdoch was a good friend of mine. Bruce – who by then was about 18 years into a 25 year hiatus from songwriting and performing – had had his first full-length LP, 33 1/3 Revolutions per Minute, produced by Richie. We got to talking about Bruce and Richie played a couple of lines from “Let’s Lay Down Our Drums,” one of Bruce’s songs from that 1971 LP during the sound check. He said it was a song he always meant to learn.
A few hours later, Richie did a beautiful version of the complete song during the concert.
In 2003, Richie played the Champlain Valley Folk Festival in Vermont where I was a main stage MC. We were chatting backstage and I thanked him for doing that Bruce Murdoch song in Montreal. Richie thanked me for reminding him of Bruce and his songs and that he felt compelled to work up the song after our chat.
Pictured: Richie Havens at the 2003 Champlain Valley Folk Festival (Photo: Janice Hanson)
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--Mike Regenstreif
