Celebration of Life Festival 1971

Celebration of Life Festival
Various Artists
Cypress Pointe Plantation
McCrea, Louisiana
June 24-27, 1971

Audience Recording

John Sebastian
(June 24, 6PM, 1st festival performance on main stage)
01. I Had A Dream
02. Lovin' You
03. She's A Lady
04. Nashville Cats
05. Did You Ever Have to Make Up Your Mind?

WAR (9:22)
(June 24)
06. Sun Oh Son -
07. Lonely Feelin' - Get Down

Chuck Berry (28:24)
(June 24)
08. Nadine
09. Memphis, Tennessee
10. Sweet Little 16
11. School Day (Ring Ring Goes The Bell)
12. Around & Around
13. Oh Louisiana
14. Promised Land (cut)
15. Reelin' & Rockin'
16. My Ding-A-Ling (lyric singalong intros, then cuts)

Stoneground (1:01:52)
(June 25)
17. Looking For You
18. Great Changes Since I've Been Born
19. Rainy Day in June
20. Bad News
21. Passion Flower
22 Total Destruction To Your Mind

Ted Nugent & The Amboy Dukes (1:23:07)
(June 25)
23. "Cannon Balls" guitar jam
24. Prodigal Man (?) (fragment only)

Fire Wind (1:33:09)
(June 26)
25. "Coming Together" (?)

Country Joe McDonald (1:38:40)
(June 26)
26. "It's Been A Long, Long Time"(?) (only known version!)
27. Entertainment Is My Business
28. Kiss My Ass
29. Red Hot Mama
30. Freedom Is A Constant Struggle
31. Not So Sweet Martha Lorraine
32. The "Fish" Cheer /I-Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-to-Die Rag
33. Janis

Potliquor (2:00:54)
(June 26)
34. Riverboat

Black Oak Arkansas (2:03:12)
(June 26)
35. Jailhouse Rock (fragment)

Arlo Guthrie (2:04:32)
(June 26)
36. Rosie Rag
37. Hobo's Lullaby

Chambers Brothers (2:10:17)
(likely after midnight, so actually the 27th)
38. Love Peace & Happines

In June 24-27, 1971, the Celebration of Life, an ambitious, eight-day rock festival, was held on the banks of the Atchafalaya River at the Cypress Pointe Plantation in McCrea, Louisiana.

The festival promoters leased the 500-acre soybean plantation for $20,000 after being evicted from two previous sites.

The organizers failed to nail down a location before marketing the event, and it had to be re-located several times at the last minute. The location was publicized as soon as the property was found and people from all over the country started traveling there.

The locals tried to block the festival, but once people started to show up, they realized that the safest thing to do—since the roads were congested and people were parked alongside the road for miles and miles—was to let people on the property. So they erected the stage and started the festival.

Unfortunately while workers were rushing to get everything ready and erecting the big sound tower, a storm came in and caused the tower to collapse. One of the big scaffolding poles pierced a worker through his torso. The consequence of all the unexpected delays was that instead of the eight days that had been advertised, the festival started four days late and ended up being only four days long. The schedule change caused a lot of bands to cancel their appearances.

In a matter of hours, the rock festival had more than doubled the population of Pointe Coupee Parish, for a festival that boasted an impressive lineup of acts. The festival site was poorly equipped to handle this flood of people and the conditions were really bad. It was miserably hot and mosquitos and other bugs were an issue as was the lack of food, water, medical and sanitary facilities.

There was one store, visible from the festival site, which sold everything on its shelves. These issues plus public outrage at the actions of some of the attendees resulted in the festival ending earlier than scheduled.

By it's conclusion on the third day, over 150,000 people had gathered to enjoy the music and the amusing side shows. Alas, at least four people had drowned in the fast-rushing Atchafalaya River due to a tremendous unannounced current / undertow, one person died from a drug overdose and Undercover cops made more than 100 drug busts.

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