# Why was Sha Na na at Woodstock? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 11, 2006, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093 "2006-07-11T22:42:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Gangster\_Octopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a8b319/32.png) [@Gangster\_Octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gangster_Octopus)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2006, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/41 "2006-07-12T16:13:19Z")
I guess one way to think that they were an odd choice was that they were essentially a cover band from a different era. Were there any other cover bands at Woodstock? Even though Sha-na-na were a contemoporary band they were not playing contemporary music and I ma not sure that any other band there was like that at all. ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2006, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/42 "2006-07-12T16:26:09Z")
> [@Gangster Octopus](#): > > Were there any other cover bands at Woodstock? Richie Havens, Joe Cocker, Joan Baez, and probably Johnny Winter all did mostly covers at Woodstock. Apparently Blood Sweat & Tears and Joe Cocker both covered one song (“More and More”) on the same day! And I’d say Ravi Shankar was _far_ more different from the rest of the acts at the festival than Sha-Na-Na was. ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2006, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/43 "2006-07-12T16:34:02Z")
To expand on my comments about covers, I should have specified that Sha-Na-Na was not the only band that presented '50s material at the festival. Mountain did “Blue Suede Shoes,” Johnny Winter did “Johnny B. Goode,” Creedence did “I Put a Spell on You,” Ten Years After’s famous version of “I’m Going Home” was really an oldies medley, the Who did “Summertime Blues,” and so on. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2006, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/44 "2006-07-12T16:52:29Z")
> [@Biffy the Elephant Shrew](#): > > As for major stars, obviously you forgot Jimi. Yes, I forgot him. > [@Biffy the Elephant Shrew](#): > > I don’t even agree that CCR were so despised–surely they were hipper than the Clayton-Thomas incarnation of BST. Not really. They were considered a top 40 hitmaker group, just barely above bubblegum. And Clayton-Thomas’s BST was considered pretty hip – at least until they started shilling for the Nixon Administration. Quite a few of the other names had underground reputations, but they were not well-known to the general music buyers – at least, not until the Woodstock album came out. > [@Gangster Octopus](#): > > I guess one way to think that they were an odd choice was that they were essentially a cover band from a different era. Were there any other cover bands at Woodstock? Even though Sha-na-na were a contemoporary band they were not playing contemporary music and I ma not sure that any other band there was like that at all. Blood, Sweat, and Tears did covers, too, as did Joe Cocker. But the issue was simply that Sha Na Na was a new upcoming act with a lot of good regional buzz. That makes them very much like many of the acts at the concert. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2006, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/45 "2006-07-12T17:07:30Z")
In 1969— • “Johnny B. Goode” was a regular part of Jimi Hendrix’s playlist. • The Beatles’ were recording the 1958 rockabilly song “One After 909” for the _Let It Be_ album. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2006, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/46 "2006-07-12T17:14:50Z")
> [@Spectre of Pithecanthropus](#): > > Was that the tour they made a movie of? I think I saw it, but I don’t remember Sha-Na-Na. Maybe they just didn’t put their spot in the film. The film is “Festival Express” which is now out on DVD (it took many years for it to be put together). It is well worth watching, particularly the party/jamming footage in the train cars. Sha-Na-Na is in the film, and were applauded by the audience at the time. I wouldn’t say that they were out of the norm in that tour simply because there was no norm – it was simply good musicians that young people enjoyed. Financially, the tour did poorly, for there was a boycot based on a demand from youth that the concerts should all be free, and supported by the mayor of one of the tour cities. The musicians were not receptive to this, for obvious reasons, and the promotor punched out the mayor. All in all, the trip appeared to be one hell of a trip. The film is well worth watching: [http://www.festivalexpress.com/](http://www.festivalexpress.com/) ---
**Author:** ![scotandrsn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a4c791/32.png) [@scotandrsn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scotandrsn)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2006, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/47 "2006-07-12T17:24:05Z")
Just to add to what I was saying earlier [This](http://people.hofstra.edu/faculty/robert_a_leonard/images/rock-n-roll/Group-stage_yellow.jpg) is Sha Na Na in the late 60s. Let’s just say they were a little less polished and campy than the act we saw on their late 1970s TV show. I don’t see them being particularly out of place at Woodstock. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2006, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/48 "2006-07-12T17:33:08Z")
From _Happy Days and Wonder Years: The Fifties and the Sixties in Contemporary Cultural Politics_, by Daniel Marcus (2004): > [@](#): > > In 1969, rock promoter Richard Nader put on the first of his “1950’s Rock and Roll Revival” concerts, which would ultimately play in more than seventy cities over the next decade. Nader assembled oldies acts like Bill Haley and the Comets, Chuck Berry, the Platters, and the Coasters to perform short sets of their best-known hits at Madison Square Garden, and added Sha Na Na to the bill as well. The media reported that the crowd was an unusual mixture of teenagers and those who were teenagers in the 1950s, a combination rarely seen at other rock shows. The Revivals became particularly popular in New York, where the _New York Times_ reported a 1970 concert was “filled with an audience of every imaginable hair length and clothing style, drug freaks pressed against Westchester Young Republicans collaberating to remember all the lyrics to ‘Mr. Earl’ or somesuch.” ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2006, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/49 "2006-07-12T17:53:49Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > From _Happy Days and Wonder Years: The Fifties and the Sixties in Contemporary Cultural Politics_, by Daniel Marcus (2004): You’ve added yet another to my list of books I intend to read. Damn you. -FrL- ---
**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2006, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/50 "2006-07-12T18:26:04Z")
Sort of related: –Phil Ochs once bummed out his hippie audience by showing up for his concert in [gold lame’.](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0000011T1/sr=1-16/qid=1152728218/ref=sr_1_16/103-2716243-6515852?ie=UTF8&s=music) . He justified it by saying that Elvis had more to do with him being a musician than Che Guevara. Sha Na Na weren’t the only ones to draw a line from Elvis to that era. –Sha Na Na still tours, but few if any of the original members are a part of it. Mary Wilson, formerly of the Supremes, is trying to get legislation to curb “oldies” bands that don’t actually feature the original members. She cited five separate touring groups calling themselves “The Supremes” and… Sha Na Na. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2006, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/51 "2006-07-12T20:13:41Z")
> [@ddgryphon](#): > > In a slightly broader perscpective: At the time of Woodstock, you could hear The Doors and Johnny Cash on the same radio station – Back in those days targeted lists, were pretty much just begining to appear and targeted stations weren’t truly organized. In short, people listened to a greater variety of things and didn’t dismiss something out of hand because of genre or style. > > I know many dopers here feel, as I do, that the subdividing of music into artificial genres and zombie loyalty to a single type of performance style is pretty much what killed listening to radio being pleasureable. > > I miss the variety of music being generally available and only the internet has helped bring some of that back. (end mini-rant). I’m with you. Joplin did Summertime. The Beatles did show tunes. As for the rock and roll revival, in late '68 or early '69 Cat Mother had a hit with Old Time Rock and Roll. I think they opened for Hendrix - anyway he produced their first album. Delaney and Bonnie’s live album with Clapton, Dave Mason, and an uncredited George Harrison had an oldies medley also. These songs were very much in the mainstream. This all happened long before American Grafitti and Happy Days, btw. And Sha Na Na could never have been a Vegas lounge act at the time. Sinatra, Dean Martin and that crowd did Vegas. The people who went to Vegas then were the parents of us baby boomers, and a lot of them thought rock was awful. And not just whitebread people - Stan Freberg had lots of very nasty anti-rock bits. My mother was nostalgic for Benny Goodman, not Little Richard. BTW, I saw Woodstock in college, not long after the movie came out, and I assure you everyone thought Sha Na Na was very cool. ---
**Author:** ![LongHairedCountryBoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e5b9ba/32.png) [@LongHairedCountryBoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LongHairedCountryBoy)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2015, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/52 "2015-09-02T18:26:09Z")
I think if you’ll go back and read down the list of entertainers there, you’ll find a pretty good mix. Rock, Soul, Soft Rock, Folk, Hard Rock, One or two which sounded a little Rockabilly, A touch of what was the beginning of Funk. As for Sha Na Na in particular, think about it. They were formed in the late 50s or early 60s, I think, while Doo Wop was in. And it didn’t start fading until the mid 60s. Go back and listen to the Beatles first few albums. They were nothing but just another Doo Wop band for a few years after they crossed the Big Pond. They became popular because they were foreigners with “long” hair and of course the chicks loved their accent. They were already a sensation while they were still playing incredibly elementary stuff. I personally think they get too much credit. In my mind, Hendrix is the dude most responsible for revolutionizing Rock. Zeppelin wasn’t sittin’ on the bench, either. Pink Floyd brought something like no one had ever heard. Whoever got it rolling, after the Beatles, Hendrix, Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd, Rock and Roll would never be the same. And 'm so incredibly thankful to have grown up in the 60s and 70s to experience all that. The best twenty years of music ever. Or at least I modern times. [https://youtu.be/bW5M5xljdCI?list=RDdATyZBEeDJ4](https://youtu.be/bW5M5xljdCI?list=RDdATyZBEeDJ4) ---
**Author:** ![stillownedbysetters](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/41988e/32.png) [@stillownedbysetters](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stillownedbysetters)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2015, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/53 "2015-09-02T18:50:34Z")
Could it have been something so simple as they were local, available, and not too expensive? ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2015, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/54 "2015-09-02T18:51:27Z")
> [@LongHairedCountryBoy](#): > > I think if you’ll go back and read down the list of entertainers there, you’ll find a pretty good mix. Rock, Soul, Soft Rock, Folk, Hard Rock, One or two which sounded a little Rockabilly, A touch of what was the beginning of Funk. I think if you’ll go back and read the OP, or any other post, you’ll realize that you’re posting in a 9 year old thread and that a lot of what you think about Sha Na Na is wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2015, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/55 "2015-09-02T19:02:24Z")
The poster didn’t say anything about Sha Na Na other than that they were Doo Wop. What’s the ‘a lot’ they’re wrong about? ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2015, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/56 "2015-09-02T19:27:35Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > The poster didn’t say anything about Sha Na Na other than that they were Doo Wop. What’s the ‘a lot’ they’re wrong about? When they were formed, that they were foreigners, and that they get any credit for “revolutionizing” rock. Eta: reading more carefully, I now see those last two were directed at the Beatles. I leave it to you to decide if he’s right with those comments. ---
**Author:** ![Charlie\_Wayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4bbf92/32.png) [@Charlie\_Wayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Charlie_Wayne)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2015, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/57 "2015-09-02T21:12:56Z")
That is an excellent freaking question! Indeed! ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2015, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/58 "2015-09-02T21:18:45Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > The poster didn’t say anything about Sha Na Na other than that they were Doo Wop. What’s the ‘a lot’ they’re wrong about? He thinks Sha Na Na was formed in the late 1950s or early 1960s. Sha Na Na formed in 1969. He thinks the Beatles were a doo wop band “for a few years after they crossed the Big Pond.” The Beatles were never a doo wop band, despite their heavy use of vocal harmonies and obvious doo wop influences; they were always a rock & roll band. He thinks doo wop didn’t start fading until the mid 1960s, despite the fact that the genre peaked in 1961. He thinks the Beatles became popular because of their long hair and accents, despite the fact that they were popular because they wrote and recorded fantastic songs. It’s not like they were on EmptyVision (which didn’t exist until 1981) or Top of the Pops (not until 1966, anyway, but the show didn’t exist until 1964, almost a year after their first #1 UK hit, “Please Please Me”). They were popular because their songs were good and people bought their records, not because of what they looked like or their accents, both in the UK and the US. I think that about covers the factual stuff that is wrong. ETA: I wrote poorly in my previous post; I meant to call attention to multiple errors, not just pertaining to Sha Na Na. Mea culpa. ---
**Author:** ![Charlie\_Wayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4bbf92/32.png) [@Charlie\_Wayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Charlie_Wayne)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2015, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/59 "2015-09-02T21:21:32Z")
> [@Gary\_T](#): > > Are you saying you understand the reasons why every other act at Woodstock was there, and only Sha Na Na’s appearance baffles you? (If so) Why is that? Oh my! What a wonderful post! Indeed! I just hope that one of you boys will not pull a nuclear bomb out of your pocket. Why? Because I’m guessing it will be a real working bomb. ---
**Author:** ![gaffa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e68b1a/32.png) [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2015, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093/60 "2015-09-02T22:42:51Z")
The promoters got _Sha-Na-Na_ because they couldn’t get their first choice, Gene Autry. I’m serious. The original plan was to have the singing cowboy close the show with _Happy Trails_. People have always had nostalgia, and the kids of the late 60s were nostalgic for the late 50s. By the way, contrary to the nonsense he’s been spreading for decades, Michael Shrive of \*Santana \*was \*\*not \*\*the youngest performer at _Woodstock_. Henry Gross of _Sha-Na-Na_ was. Gross was 18, while Shrive had just turned 20. Gross later had a huge hit with the song _Shannon_. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-sha-na-na-at-woodstock/364093.md?page=4)