Seven Questions:
Rona Elliot, Rock Journalist/Editor - 'The Woodstock Experience'
http://laist.com/2009/08/28/seven_questions_rona_elliot_rock_jo.php?gallery0Pic=2
8/28/09
Today's subject is Rona Elliot.
As a rock journalist, Rona Elliot has had the opportunity to
eyewitness and participate in some of music's most memorable moments.
The former music correspondent for NBC's "Today" show broke the first
Band Aid story in London out of Abbey Road studios in 1984, worked at
historic Live Aid, was the first to interview Tina Turner during her
acclaimed comeback and traveled the world with her. Rona, who
currently teaches music business class at UCLA extension, was on hand
to report on Nelson Mandela's welcoming at London's Wembley Stadium,
she traveled with the Rolling Stones for the first rock concert ever
in then Czechoslovakia, served as VH1's first news anchor and was in
the USSR for the country's first rock concert ever with Billy Joel.
Forty years ago, Rona was working in public and community relations
for a little concert called Woodstock. Her first-hand experience at
what is perhaps the most famous music festival of all time matched
with her incredible ability to interview music legends is on display
in The Woodstock Experience, a remarkable limited edition hand-bound
dual-book package from London-based Genesis Publications featuring
words from the original festival producer Michael Lang and photos
from official Woodstock photographer Henry Diltz.
Rona who currently resides in Los Angeles took some time to speak
with LAist about the making of The Woodstock Experience, working on
the festival, rock journalism and the current state of music.
1) How did you get connected with Genesis Publications?
Genesis Publications is a UK company. What they do is make the most
beautiful and magical limited edition collectible books. The books
are usually between $650 to $1,000 and there's usually only 1,000
copies. Genesis prides themselves on creating books that feature
collections of photographs that nobody has ever seen.
For example, there's a book called T.O.T.A. '75, Tour of the
Americas. The book has a collection of photos from the photographer
who was on the road with the Rolling Stones from 1973-75. The book
not only has his astonishing photos of the Rolling Stones, but it has
every memo, every room key, everything that a collector would truly
love. Because they're limited edition, they have these incredible
photographs, made in the UK, printed in Milan and hand bound, they're
just theses astonishing pieces of collectible art.
I first heard about Genesis because I wrote a story about a book.
This was about 20 years ago, when I was working on the Today show. I
was writing a story about a book called Fifty Years Adrift which was
written by Derek Taylor. Derek was The Beatles' publicist. I was
holding in my hand a book that was a complete history of The Beatles
from someone who was there since day one. Derek had kept every
ticket, every memo, every song note, every lyric, every postcard and
all of his memories. And there was the history of The Beatles in my
hand. I just couldn't believe it. I did my story about the book,
which cost $1,000 at that time.
Genesis had created this treasure, something that someone like me who
cares so much about music would want to own. If a book came along
that was really important, I'd buy it. It just became this incredibly
precious thing to me to have the history of a particular band in my
hand. Little did I know that some years later fate would cause me to
intersect with Genesis in a very LA way.
Henry Diltz who's the famous rock and roll photographer who lives in
North Hollywood, I've known him since before Woodstock. He hired him
to photograph Woodstock. One day back in the 90s, he said to me,
'Some day I want to have a book.'
Henry was the kind of guy who kept notes and scrap papers from
everything he had done. I told Henry, 'If you ever want to do that,
these are the only people (Genesis) in the world who could do that
with you.' I showed him all of the Genesis books I had collected.
Fast forward 12 years, he tells me, 'They're doing a book on me.' I
then contacted Genesis and I end up having a series of conversations
with the owner. We were having a chat one day and without ever
mentioning what I do he asked me, 'Do you know anyone who interviews
musicians?' I said, 'That would be me, it's all I've done for the
past 30 years and I've interviewed many of the legends in Henry's photos.'
From here I started to build a relationship with Genesis both from
working on Henry's book and from having known Henry for so long. The
photos in Henry's book were everyone that was relevant in the Los
Angeles music scene between '68 and '74, Henry documented the whole thing.
I was interviewing John Sebastian for Henry's book who lived with
Henry and my friend during that time period at a place called "The
Farm" off of Barham Blvd. John lived in a tie-dyed tent and wore
tie-dyed clothes. Henry had a lot of pictures of him. John came to
Woodstock, NY to be interviewed and brought with him a piece of
tie-dyed from that time period which Henry had photographed. That
tied-eye became the template for the cover of Henry's book, that
piece of tie-dyed went to Milan where the books are printed. This
piece of tie-dyed which Henry had photographed so many years ago was
now the template for the cover of the book, this is the kind of
veracity that Genesis brings to their books.
These are my kind of people.
2) When did the idea for The Woodstock Experience come along?
In 2004, 2005 we started talking about Woodstock. I had worked at
Woodstock. Many of the people who worked at Woodstock were still in
my life. Michael Lang was still in my life. Brian Roylance who was
the founder of Genesis and we all agreed to do a Woodstock book.
Shortly after we agreed to do the book, Brian passed away. It was in
2005, he died playing soccer or rugby.
Michael Lang and myself set out to record exactly what had happened
there that summer. I personally arrived at Woodstock in May 1969. I
had been in Algeria; I had gotten a telegram from my ex-boyfriend
telling me to come home for a festival in upstate New York. I had
previously worked on the Newport Pop Festival and Miami Pop Festival.
I came back and Michael had hired me to do the local public relations
and community relations.
What was important to me in the book was to tell the story of what
really happened. We weren't interested in the opinions or the
international urban legends. We set out to interview as many
musicians who were still alive, as many people who worked the event
that we could find.
3) What does Woodstock mean to you?
While it's a badge of honor, and always a conversation stopper when I
mention my work on the festival, it's also a part of my personal
history. It's shaped me as a person, and it's shaped the lives of all
the people who were there. From the people on staff to the people
stuck in the mud to the musicians, it's a part of their personal
history as well. I mean it was Santana's first big gig. One of the
guys who played with Jimi Hendrix, had never played in public before.
He was Jimi's roommate. There's just a million stories like that.
The festival was different things to different people. If you were
anti-war, Woodstock was an anti-war festival. If you were a hippie,
Woodstock was a free love festival. For the people who were down by
the lake and never got in, it was three days of being in a lake
naked. For the people who were stuck in the jammed up traffic, it was
a party on a highway. Everyone had their own individual experience.
People often ask me, 'What did it really mean?' Here's what I tell
people - Here we are 40 years later and all the around the world
you'll still hear the festival being mentioned. When Barack Obama was
being inaugurated, you heard CNN, USA Today and other news outlets
refer to the moment as "Obama's Woodstock." That's shorthand for
peaceful gathering, where people get along, nobody gets hurt and a
vision is shared. That's the legacy.
4) Was there anyone, whether that's an artist or a staff member, who
was difficult to track down for an interview but you felt like you
HAD to have them to make the book complete?
There were people who didn't want to talk about it because they were
tired of talking about it. People who didn't have a good experience.
People who were dead. People who were writing their own book. There
were people of various stripes that we came across along the way.
We started out with a complete list of all the people involved and
went through it. Janice, gone. Jimi, gone. And so on. Then there were
those who are still around but are missing in action like Sly (Sly in
the Family Stone) who put on one of the most astonishing performances
of the festival. A lot of the staff isn't around either, which is sad
for me because you know, we all lived together.
5) Since you were working at the festival, how much of the music
performances were you actually able to see?
I didn't get to see much. My greatest recollection was Jimi Hendrix.
I was busy working but I do remember being blown away by Jimi's
performance. It was early in the morning, we were in our trailer and
I just remember hearing these other-worldly sounds from Jimi and his
rendition of the National Anthem. He was unbelievable. One of the
greatest things I've ever heard. That remains for me, I saw Jimi at
Monterey when he set his guitar on fire but that Woodstock set to me
is the best.
I was so focused on my work at the festival, because it really did
take a village to put it all together so I couldn't see much but if I
was going to see anything I'm glad I got to experience that.
6) You were the music correspondent for the Today show on NBC for a
decade. How did you come into that position? Also, currently national
news programs like the Today show have gone away from covering music
and have simply thrown it in with pop culture/entertainment coverage.
What do you think caused this transition in the way music is covered?
I had a long history in music journalism and radio. I was very
involved in breaking the Band Aid and Live Aid stories. There was a
visionary producer at the Today show named Steve Freidman. I had done
a lot of work with Tina Turner in radio, network radio which was in
the same facility as NBC. I went down to the third floor of the
building where the Today show was located and I approached Steve and
said I had this vision for doing something with music on the show. I
told them you may not hire me, but nobody's ever going to do it better.
This was before celebrity journalism and gossip journalism, well I
don't even call it journalism I just call it gossip and junk.My
vision was to do long form sit-down interviews with the musicians,
which is something I had been doing for a long time on the radio. The
Today show says, well if you're so great, get me interviews with Tina
Turner and Bruce Springsteen - mind you this was 1984. So I wrote to
Tina and asked her; she responded to me saying I'd done so much for
her with radio that she'd do whatever I needed.
She agreed to let me interview her for the Today show. That interview
was unlike anything done on television before. I got to travel with
her, go backstage, and did some lengthy interviews with her. Over the
next ten years, I'd do that with pretty much everybody. I got to
travel the world.
I never asked anyone about who they were dating or what they were
wearing because I didn't care. For me it was all about the music and
what this music communicated and where it was coming from. How did
Eric Clapton come up with "Layla?"
I never did what you see on television now. I can't watch that stuff.
I treated the musicians with enormous respect because music was such
a large part of my life. Thanks to NBC, I was able to travel the
world with great musicians and share their gifts and tell their
stories. I felt like it was a privledge, every day that I had that job.
I left the job because I felt like it was time to go. I felt like
things were changing. The value that I ascribed to was moving into a
different world.
The long form interview just isn't valued anymore. I mean you still
see it on "60 Minutes" but fast and cheesy, and drug addictions and
who's sleeping with with who sells. I think if the people were fed
quality work, there would be a marketplace for it. I don't want to
insult anyone's work but I just think that I have a different set of
standards and values and that's not what's being sold to the people
right now. The pendulum will swing back eventually. In this age of
Twitter and tweeting, hearing Eric Clapton describe his writing
process is something different.
7) You've mentioned that much of your career in music was spent in
radio. What do you think of the current state of radio, especially
radio here in Los Angeles, where so many stations have turned to the
"Top 40" format?
I don't think you're going to find good music on any of these
stations. That's just not where good music is. That's where Britney
Spears and the Jonas Brothers are. As I explained to my kids who are
12, there's always going to be people who listen to pop music, and
take nothing away from them.
The difference is, when I was listening to Top 40 you would hear the
1910 Fruitgum Company but you'd also hear Jimi Hendrix. Top 40 back
then was color blind. You had rock and roll, hard rock, you had
Smokey Robinson and Motown records, it was a little bit of
everything. That's not what you hear now. In order to hear Motown
now, you've got to listen to K-Earth or KJLH.
Top 40 today is not what it was back then. You will not hear quality
music there. To me, Mariah Carey, and no offense intended, but that's
not good music. It's just pop music. Britney Spears - forgettable.
Madonna - flushable. This is just an opinion, and opinions are like
assholes but Madonna hasn't made a lasting song. Not saying that we
won't be hearing her music in 40 years, but I'd like someone to
explain to me the long-lasting value, the contribution that her music
has made. Sure, it makes people dance but it's not music from my
point of view.
I just don't see music serving a larger purpose anymore. It's here to
sell commercial time. If I want to find new music,I'll go on Pandora
or some other sites or I'll call up people whose taste in music I trust.
.
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