Richie Havens
Richie Havens
Richard Pierce Havens, known professionally as Richie Havens, was an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. His music encompassed elements of folk, soul, and rhythm and blues. He is best known for his intense and rhythmic guitar style, soulful covers of pop and folk songs, and his opening performance at the 1969 Woodstock Festival...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionFolk Singer
Date of Birth21 January 1941
CityBrooklyn, NY
CountryUnited States of America
It's a brand new world, and it's just beginning again, but on such a wonderful level of being able to communicate with each other directly, being able to talk to people all over the world,
In the last two years, the youngest people are asking me for the oldest songs, ... I'm talking kids . It blows my mind. I look at them and go, 'How could you have heard that song? I haven't sung it in 20 years.' It's like I'm just starting now. I finally got a career.
It's the first time that the original people were invited back to play, ... They're doing it right. It's going to be a wonderful 30th anniversary and reunion. I'm looking forward to it.
Go around the middleman; get your music straight to the people, ... You've got the Web now. Do it. Don't even hesitate. Because people want to hear real music, and there's a lot of talented kids out there, millions of them as far as I'm concerned, and they really have something to say. And they just needed their medium, and now they have it. That's what I tell them. Go to the Web ... but do it.
When I flew over the crowd, that's what I said to myself, ... I said, 'If they put this picture in the newspaper, it's all over for them, because now they can't hide us anymore .'
The direction for my music is heaven, of course. We gear all things to the realm of heaven - which is the mind, the organized mind.
I started out by myself, but it eventually turned into a trio by the mid-'60s - a conga drum and another guitarist. And that's been mostly what I've worked with most of the time.
I opened the Woodstock Festival even though I was supposed to be fifth. I said, 'What am I doing here? No, no, not me, not first!' I had to go on stage because there was no one else to go on first - the concert was already two-and-a-half hours late.
My right wrist is connected to the left foot. You know, if the left foot doesn't work, the right wrist doesn't work, and that's really the truth.
I eat once a day if I remember, and I try never to go to sleep.
I don't get sick. I can't afford to get sick.
I believe I inherited my sense of music from my father. My father was an ear piano player; he could just hear something and play it.
Woodstock was both a peaceful protest and a global celebration.
Many times, people have come up to me after singing some songs, and they'd say, 'Richie, do you know what you did?' And I'd say, 'What?' And they'd go, 'I wrote these songs down for you to sing, and you sang them all in a row.' But that's the kind of communication that happens, you know.