I just missed Woodstock. I was 14 at the time and was unaware what was going on 75 miles north of where I grew up in the Bronx, New York that weekend in August 40 years ago..

But I made up for this mightily, getting stoned at the movie, spending countless hours listening to the soundtrack and going to see many of the festival's stars in the months that followed.

In fact, I caught Santana and Ten Years After separately at the Fillmore East in 1970 and 1971, and Sly & the Family Stone at Madison Square Garden.

Twenty-five years later in 1994, I attended Woodstock II. I had a blast in the muddy field in Saugerties where the '69 fest was originally slated to be held before it was moved 20 miles west to Bethel. (This story is lovingly told in Taking Woodstock, opening Aug. 28.)

This was my Woodstock - a terrific mixture of old (Santana, Traffic, the Allman Brothers), mainstream (Peter Gabriel, Aerosmith) and new (Green Day, Blues Traveler, Sheryl Crow, Cypress Hill).

But I could see the seeds of discontent in the crowd that exploded five years later at the 30th anniversary on a parched airbase farther upstate in Rome. That event, of course, is noted for the final-day riot, fires and rapes.

The Woodstock ideal died a slow death that weekend in 1999.

Woodstock co-founder Michael Lang had an idea for a 40th anniversary concert to be held for free in Brooklyn's Prospect Park, just a mile from where I now live. But he was unable to stir up sponsors to foot the bill or much support from the city.

Since there's no event specifically marking the 40th year since Woodstock, I made the pilgrimage to Bethel, where the site is now housed by a performing arts center, for the "Heroes of Woodstock" show on Aug. 15 featuring Jefferson Starship, Canned Heat, Ten Years After, Levon Helm, Country Joe McDonald, Big Brother and Mountain.

Read my review here

Also see:

Sly & the Family Stone's "I Wanna Take You Higher"
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