Harry Belafonte gives an inspirational introduction to the original production of HAIR on the 1969 Tony Awards (cast includes Melba moore and Ben Vareen)
You look at this and realize that this was April 20th 1969. In two months, June, there would be the Stonewall Riots, in three months , July, Man would land on the Moon, and in four months time , August, there would be Woodstock. What an incredible year.
The young girl in black in the gold sweater is my cousin Gerrie Griffin she was 16 years old was a lead singer with the voices of east Harlem she's 66 years old now doing well. Funny thing I drive a bus in new Jersey and from time to time during route melba moore would ride . They were in the same play .
Fantastic. I'm only watching this to spot the Soul singers. Melba Moore is easy to spot but I can't find Tobi Lark or Betty Lloyd. Cash in The Voices of East Harlem was massive in the UK ☺
+Lee D It has always been a dream of mine to go back in time to that era (I was part of it then) and be one of the tribe. I googled "linda compton hair" Linda was gorgeous. You are quite a lucky man have shared her stories.
+Being Glaun Well, we grew-up then...she was from Brooklyn and I was pretty nomadic traveling with my father who was a career Air Force officer. We met in Houston in the late '70s and the rest is history, as they say. She went to audition with a couple of friends...all three made the original off-broadway show...she traveled with the show from '68 until '76 or so....even to Spain We met in Houston in the late '70s.We have many photographs of the cast and her with staring partners.
Yes, my wife is the red head with the red scarf at 7:03, stage left...she is features on the Off Broadway CD which is in this set link through Amazon which also had the Broadway version...www.amazon.com/Galt-MacDermot-Interview-Musical-Theater/dp/B0013CXZAG/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1470342177&sr=8-2&keywords=Original+Off+Broadway+musical+Hair
@@briansavage8887 Of course, you are right. I hope Mr. Freed misspoke because she looked so young in "Hair." If I remember correctly, they were all referred to as kids. However, in 1969, Ms. Moore was in her 20's. Her character Dionne was probably supposed to be a teenager. As I mentioned in another post, I met her about 15 years ago. She was visiting my church. It was amazing!
Listening to every Hair video offered on youtube and watching the movie Hair again, one of the most devastating films ever made. "Artists are emotional people," says the beautiful Harry Bellafonte. Everyone is an artist moved to laughter and tears by this timeless story from Rado, Ragni and MacDermot.
Fun to watch! I remember those days. Many People would have been shocked by this performance at the time. It must have been amazing for the performers to be a part of this show!
This is a great little time capsule.You can hear when the audience starts applauding towards the end of Let the Sunshine In,the singers on stage can't hear the band as well and start going off time with the music.Luckily the song was almost over anyway,so no major catastrophe.And the funny coincidence about the joke Zero made is that just a few years later his son Josh would appear in the film version of another well known rock musical,Jesus Christ Superstar.
@@trompeta79 Yay! I'm so happy to hear! Have you checked out her Tony awards performance in Purlie? I think a year or 2 later. Cray-Cray High Belt! Amazing!
This is the real deal. Oliver and The Fifth Dimension made good, competent commercial versions for popular consumption on the radio but this has heart and grit.
@@charlesveg ... This is true. I envy my parents having lived during this time of gritty reality. Even my middle-aged self born in the 70's can relate to and recall authentic, soulful singing and acting. I'm glad we know what the real deal is.
Heather Macrae as Sheila singing with Melba, Linda Comptons family, I was the guy with the car who occasionally drove Linda& Suzy Norstrand home after work, even Ben with a huge afro,I had a little brown firebird parked next door to the biltmore, hope Lindas well, send my love, Jason here
@@sharonmahoney9333 I double checked, its Heather yet it was the tonys with the original cast, Lynn was the first sheila then Diane Keaton then heather, why she would be on the tonys I dont know, Lynn just passed.
The late sixties era hippies peace & love etc was much beleaguered...what is our ethos now...selfies narcissism smart phones materialism..what happened...my heart sinks......x
Today is the *50* year anniversary of when the cast of Hair performed during the Emmys. 🤓 EDIT- 3:11 P.M.: *finishes video 12 minutes later* When I first watched this video over a month ago, the only song that I recognized was "Let the Sunshine In". I now know the name of the first song. It's called "Three-Five-Zero-Zero".
Love me some Hair.....I didn't know Ben Vereen was part of the original cast.....there is a RnB singer , who passed away years ago name Ronnie Dyson, "If U let me love to U, why can't I touch U" is in this performance. Melba Moore has a voice strictly made for the theater, it's a shame she never was able to do more....Loved her in Purlie!
Being from that enlightened and inspired era, I am thoroughly discouraged and disgusted by the current state of hawkish, nationalistic affairs, the shocking contrast is almost too much for me to bear. In order to cope, all I can do is plagiarize the famous quote, "Let all the poisons that lurk in the mud hatch out", and hope the poisonous abscess bursts and saves the planet.
1969 - Nixon was in the White House, we were in Vietnam, and we were just a year out from Kent State. I respect the political organizing and social revolution of the time, but there was much wrong too. I hope that the explosion of protest and organizing in the last month have helped you feel more hopeful. I've seen people who've never been politically active educating their kids about civil rights, taking to the streets, and pushing back against hate. We have tough road ahead of us, but when has that not been the case?
Oh yes. My parents saw Hair, I believe at the Pantages Theatre. My mother had the soundtrack album and played it often when we were children. It was not until I was older that my friends and I worked out the meaning of some of the lyrics. Free love, indeed.
Watching this is a reminder that the Broadway revival of Hair didn't get it right. Not that all of it was bad but from the portions of it that I've heard. But it definitely lacks the passion of this.
I agree and although the vocals are wonderful they are completely contrary to the soul of the music and what was being stated. Cassie Levy sings the s#@t outta Easy to be hard but it's far to polished it lacks the raw nature and emotional core that was present in the 69 production....
Of course revivals would not get it right. The Vietnam war did not end until 1973 (1975) and had started ten or so years previously. The passion is that these cast members are commenting on what is going on now for them. My mother, a contemporary of many of these young people, told me that people had no idea what it [society, social attitude] was like during the Vietnam war. It affected mom, it affected society and it shows here.
Because I suspect to most of them this was revolutionary - they clap before the end presumably they got a signal to! This musical is still revolutionary.
I can just hear the musical director and choreographer.... " ok kids...after the 2nd refrain of Let the Sun Shine, let go...really get into the music and go crazy"
Sorry but you are mistaken; Sally Eaton and Diane Keaton are two different people. Sally Eaton played Jeannie. Diane Keaton played an unnamed waitress in the Black Boys/White Boys number. If you look at the original cast recording of Hair , you will see them listed separately.
Nobody will believe this yet I spent nine days in total July 1969 with Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Buzz Aldrin as a secret mission as Man walked the Moon saying on July 21, 1969 " One small step for Man, One giant leap for mankind." Funny thing about this statement is I've grown up quoting it wrong by saying the latter as "One giant leap for Human Kind," live and learn hope for a better universe. I sure wish I could watch the theater performance. Dare to Dream! What incredible inspirational "
Masterpieces. When I was a kid I thought "what a piece of work is man" was written by Ragni, Rado and McDermot! LOL!! I was shocked the first time I read/heard it in the original context.. I was like.. huh???
"3-5-0-0"..."What A Piece of Work Is Man"..."The Flesh Failures/Let the Sunshine In". The original Broadway soundtrack (featuring these very performers) is a treasure. Worth seeing a live performance...the 1979 movie is an overlooked gem.
I saw the original cast of HAIR perform for free at the Central Park Be-In which I think was in September, 1969- over 50,000 people were there. I remember Melba Moore, Diane Keaton, and Heather McRae on stage. I saw HAIR again at the Delacorte Theater on August 1, 2008, and this time, got to dance on stage with the cast during the finale! One of the greatest moments of my life.
You are one of a very select group of people to witness probably, the most historically relevent theater work of all time!!! Thank you for sharing a glimpse of your amazing experience!!!
I first saw HAIR in 1972 for my 13th birthday. I was hooked! Then came the 1979 and 2009 revivals, and various community theater productions. I’ll always be a HAIR groupie!
Julia Wilkinson, I saw it live in Chicago in 1969 at the Schubert Theater. To this day, it is the play that had the most profound effect on me. I still listen to the music often.
This play was more than just important. Hair helped to shape the woman I am today. It's anti war message became a part of my conscience. And my husband of 40yrs. has long beautiful hair.
Chills. Wish the original cast performance of the show in its entirety could be purchased. Finally saw the show in all its overwhelming tribal glory when 40th anniversary Hair was performed outdoors at Delacorte in NYC 2008.
What modern productions get wrong is the the hippies are too clean. They were often dirty and raggedy. They weren't fresh faced, freshly scrubbed beautiful people. This video shows more or less how it was.
The new cast album even sounds so sanitized. No grit, with base and synth reduced so the melodies can be cleaner. It lost so much, the 2009 Hair Tony performance made me cringe.
Funny, I was there and don’t recall running into people who could belt out songs while waiting in line at the liquor store. Rather you encountered very smelly people who asked if you wanted to jam.
@@raniablaik6063 The production in Central Park (Shakespeare in the Park) in 2008 wasn't bad. At least they got the feeling of the show right, and it helped that most of the audience had spent the whole day in the park, waiting for tickets (it was so popular that professional line-standers would come every day & sell the tickets they received, which is against the rules of the theater and not at all in the spirit of the Public). My friends and I arrived at 6am and waited for tickets; since we were a large, unusually multi-racial group who had clearly not seen that production or waited for its tickets before - the staff would have remembered us if we'd already been there - we were pulled from the ticket line and given seats in the front row. It was a great experience; we got to dance on stage with the Tribe. Later, when a version of that production transferred to Broadway, I had no interest in seeing it; nothing they could do would top seeing the show outside.
If you have seen productions in recent years...the songs are the same basically but the "feeling" is just not there...this Cast lived the era...felt the emotions...and they let it all out on stage....THIS was HAIR.....all much later versions did not have the "FEELING"...
*How could they have the same feeling?* Unless you live in the time and/or experience what happens it is impossible. So much judgement for the later versions lacking in the true emotion of the original... what is going to happen 30 or 50 years from now when someone/people performs something that was written now based on the events we're living through? The exact same thing.
We starve, look at one another short of breath Walking proudly in our winter coats Wearing smells from laboratories Facing a dying nation of moving paper fantasy Listening for the new told lies With supreme visions of lonely tunes Singing our space songs on a spiderweb sitar "Life is around you and in you" Answer for Timothy Leary, deary Let the sun shine Let The sunshine in The sun shine in Let the sun shine Let The sunshine in The sun shine in Let the sun shine Let The sunshine in The sun shine in Let the sun shine Let The sunshine in The sun shine in
In the last two refrains they get so into it almost begging. When the camera pans out and sees the audience sitting still and just watching them it gave me chills
@@fannishmarcia I did too. but we need to remember those were very different times with very different norms. Audiences didn't feel anywhere near as liberated to 'join in' with a live performance as we do now, They took themselves to be spectators only, anything else would be drawing attention to oneself. Japan for example, is _still_ like this, They clap at the very end, To do so any earlier is considered very rude.
Lindsay Miller I loved this performance the end was just wow, and what a great time to grow up in. Say hi to her if you can for me and tell her she's got a fan in Belgium, please😊 Lots of love to you guys
I wish we could gather this up, form it into a ball, and hurl it into the minds of Americans today, where it would unfurl and give us a social consciousness that we apparently have lost, or never had. Not gonna happen.
i saw the very first incarnation of this incredible show when it was the opening production of the nyc's public theater in the fall of 1967 before it moved up to the cheetah club and then onto broadway. also saw the broadway production another 3-5 times. it was so "mind-blowing" at the time.
@@johannesbols57 she also became a crack addict for a while and was homeless. She got herself out of the rut and played Fantine in Les Miserables on Broadway in the 90s. But she disappeared in the mid 80s because of drug addiction.
