Hollywood music festival

The Hollywood Music Festival was held at Leycett in the grounds of a farm near Newcastle-under-Lyme, UK, on 23rd and 24 May 1970. It was notable for the first performance of the Grateful Dead in the UK and also for the triumphant performance of the band Mungo Jerry (of "In the Summertime" fame) and featured such notable bands as Free, Ginger Baker's Air Force, Colosseum, Family, Black Sabbath and Traffic. The company responsible for the festival was Red Bus, with Ellis Elias and Elliot Cohen as the promoters. This was the first of the major festivals held in the summer of 1970 and part of the festival was to have been filmed by the BBC but the crews were unavailable.

Wild rumours circulated in the music papers about the supergroup that Lord Sutch was supposed to be fronting, Eric Clapton, John Lennon, and others were supposed to join in a super jam, but none of these luminaries showed up, nor did scheduled acts such as the James Gang and the Flying Burrito Brothers which tended to dilute the overseas offerings. Although the festival has generally tended to be eclipsed by the larger, better known festivals of 1970 such as the Isle of Wight Festival and the Bath Festival of Blues and Progressive Music 1970, it deserves to be remembered for its excellent organisation and lack of hassle as well as a great deal of memorable music. Traffic, José Feliciano and Air Force more than made up for the no-shows and, overall, around 40,000 went to Leycett to hear some great music by some of the era's best UK and US bands.

External links

* [http://www.ukrockfestivals.com/Holly-fest-menu.70.html Hollywood Music Festival History ]