Summer of Love Long Lost

Summer of Love Long Lost

Reprinted with permission of The Dallas Morning News

By Alan Peppard
Published 09-06-1999

ALAN PEPPARD

It's Labor Day. There are a few dozen of us hanging around for whom leaving town was not an option because our MasterCards (all five of them) are maxed out. We, the fiscally challenged, have but one thing to do on the unofficial last day of summer: white pants to the back of the closet, dark pants to the front.

And if you have some tie-dyed shirts in there, put 'em on to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Texas International Pop Festival. Dig out your Santana albums while Sherman and Mr. Peabody set the Way Back Machine for Labor Day 1969. Two fresh Dallas kids named Angus Wynne III and Jack Calmes started a company called Showco. Along with some partners in Atlanta, they brought 30 of the biggest acts in rock 'n' roll to the Dallas International Motor Speedway in Lewisville for a three-day festival. Actually, it was in a field next to the speedway (near the current Vista Ridge Mall).

Exactly two weeks after the original Woodstock, the Texas festival was in keeping with the Zeitgeist for kids who wanted to drop acid and run naked while listening to rock. Believe it or not, such racy things happened in Lewisville. "Let's just say it was a laissez-faire kind of situation," says Angus.

Among the 30 acts who trekked to Lewisville were Janis Joplin, Led Zeppelin, Santana, Sly & the Family Stone, Chicago, Johnny Winter, Sam & Dave, B.B. King, Freddie King, Canned Heat, Delaney & Bonnie, Todd Rundgren and his group Nazz, Minnie Riperton and her group Rotary Connection, and guitar samurai Alvin Lee and his band Ten Years After.

One band had a manager who kept telling Angus that his boys would open the show for free. Not one to turn down a freebie, Angus let the unknown group open every day of the event. Its name: Grand Funk Railroad.

Besides $100,000 in red ink, Angus took one other memento away from the legendary concert. "I have the only existing Texas Pop T-shirt left," he says.

Search the Internet for recordings from the festival. "There are a whole series of bootleg CDs from the show that have been circulating for several years," reports Angus.

A lot has changed in the 30 subsequent Labor Days. If the Texas International Pop Festival were held today, Angus speculates the mantra might be "Don't eat the pink antacid, man. It's bad antacid."

Centennial celebration

A tamer music festival will happen Thursday night when the Dallas Symphony Orchestra kicks off its 100th-anniversary season with a concert featuring cellist Yo-Yo Ma and singer Vanessa L. Williams. Before the concert, Dallas doer Myrna Schlegel and EDS exec Jeff Heller are chairing the sold-out black-tie opening-night gala.

In honor of the symphony's century mark, Myrna and Jeff are shutting down Crockett Street in front of the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center and hosting a cocktail reception there for their 1,000 guests. "The hall was built to be seen," says Myrna.

Trumpeters placed on the roof of the I.M. Pei-designed building will herald guests to enter for the seated dinner. If you haven't gotten your tickets to the gala yet, you're out of luck. First, it's sold out; second, the cheapest seat in the house is $500. The table prices range from $5,000 to $15,000.

Design of the times

Former Dallas-based fashion designer Victor Costa will be in town for a private shopping evening at the new Saks Fifth Avenue store on Sept. 23. Vogue magazine is co-hosting the event, a benefit for the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation.