The Original Woodstock No Shows

Found this in the Wikipedia stub.  The Iron Butterfly story is pretty funny.  I had no idea that Ian Anderson had such a dislike of Hippies and drug use.  

>>>>

Bob Dylan, in whose "backyard" the festival was held, was never in serious negotiation. Instead, Dylan signed in mid-July to play the Isle of Wight Festival of Music, on August 31. Dylan set sail for England on Queen Elizabeth 2 on August 15, the day the Woodstock Festival started. His son was injured by a cabin door and the family disembarked. Dylan, with his wife Sara, flew to England the following week. Dylan had been unhappy about the number of hippies piling up outside his house in the nearby town of Woodstock.[49] But, according to Google Maps, Woodstock NY is 58 miles from the festival site.

Simon & Garfunkel declined the invitation,[50] as they rather wanted to get ahead with their new album.

The Jeff Beck Group: Jeff Beck disbanded the group prior to Woodstock. "I deliberately broke the group up before Woodstock", Beck said. "I didn't want it to be preserved." It was to have been the first time that Beck would perform with Tim Bogert and Carmine Appice. Also, Beck's piano player Nicky Hopkins performed with Jefferson Airplane.[51]

Led Zeppelin was asked to perform, their manager Peter Grant stated: "We were asked to do Woodstock and Atlantic were very keen, and so was our U.S. promoter, Frank Barsalona. I said no because at Woodstock we'd have just been another band on the bill." However, the group did play the first Atlanta International Pop Festival on July 5, as one of 22 bands at the two-day event. Woodstock weekend, Zeppelin performed south of the festival at the Asbury Park Convention Hall in New Jersey. Their only time out taken was to attend Elvis Presley's show at the International Hotel in Las Vegas, on August 12.[52]

The Byrds were invited, but chose not to participate, figuring Woodstock to be no different from any of the other music festivals that summer. There were also concerns about money. As bassist John York remembers: "We were flying to a gig and Roger [McGuinn] came up to us and said that a guy was putting on a festival in upstate New York. But at that point they weren't paying all of the bands. He asked us if we wanted to do it and we said, 'No'. We had no idea what it was going to be. We were burned out and tired of the festival scene. [ ... ] So all of us said, 'No, we want a rest' and missed the best festival of all."[53]

Chicago, at the time still known as the Chicago Transit Authority, had initially been signed on to play at Woodstock. However, they had a contract with concert promoter Bill Graham, which allowed him to move Chicago's concerts at the Fillmore West. He rescheduled some of their dates to August 17, thus forcing the band to back out of the concert. Graham did so to ensure that Santana, which he managed at the time, would take their slot at the festival. According to singer and bassist Peter Cetera, "We were sort of peeved at him for pulling that one."[54]

Tommy James and the Shondells declined an invitation. Lead singer Tommy James stated later: "We could have just kicked ourselves. We were in Hawaii, and my secretary called and said, 'Yeah, listen, there's this pig farmer in upstate New York that wants you to play in his field.' That's how it was put to me. So we passed, and we realized what we'd missed a couple of days later."[55]

The Moody Blues were included on the original Wallkill poster as performers, but decided to back out after being booked in Paris the same weekend.[56]

Frank Zappa, then with The Mothers of Invention, according to the Class of the 20th Century U.S. television special, is quoted as saying "A lot of mud at Woodstock ... We were invited to play there, we turned it down."[56]

Arthur Lee and Love declined the invitation, but Mojo Magazine later described inner turmoil within the band which caused their absence at the Woodstock festival.[56]

Free was asked to perform and declined.[56] They did however play at the Isle of Wight Festival, a week later.

Mind Garage declined because they thought the festival would be no huge deal and they had a higher paying gig elsewhere.[56]

The Doors were considered as a potential performing band but canceled at the last moment. According to guitarist Robby Krieger, they turned it down because they thought it would be a "second class repeat of Monterey Pop Festival" and later regretted that decision.[57]

Spirit also declined an invitation to play, as they already had shows planned and wanted to play those instead, not knowing how big Woodstock would be.[58]

Joni Mitchell was originally slated to perform, but cancelled at the urging of her manager to avoid missing a scheduled appearance on The Dick Cavett Show.[59][60]

Lighthouse declined to perform at Woodstock.[61]

Roy Rogers was asked by Lang to close the festival with "Happy Trails" but he declined.[62]

Procol Harum was invited but refused because Woodstock fell at the end of a long tour and also coincided with the due date of guitarist Robin Trower's baby.[63]

Jethro Tull also declined. According to frontman Ian Anderson, he knew it would be a big event but he did not want to go because he did not like hippies and other concerns including inappropriate nudity, heavy drinking and drug use.[64]

Raven – attorney Miles Laurie, one of Michael Lang's lawyers set up a meeting with Raven manager Marty Angelo and offered his band a spot on the lineup but only if they signed a contract with Lang to be Raven's record producer and 10% of future earnings. Raven turned down his offer based on the fact that the year before the band played at one of the Woodstock Sound-Outs and the gig didn't go well. Lang assured them that his concert was going to be different. The band respectfully turned down.[65]

Blues Image, according to a 2011 interview with percussionist Joe Lala, agreed to appear at the Woodstock festival. Their manager did not want them to go and said, "There's only one road in and it's going to be raining, you don't want to be there". The band members were disappointed and in response said, "Don't you think it'll be beneficial that we're there?" The band instead took a gig at Binghamton.[66]

Iron Butterfly was booked to appear, and is listed on the Woodstock poster for a Sunday performance, but could not perform because they were stuck at LaGuardia Airport.[67] According to Production Coordinator John Morris, "They sent me a telegram saying, 'We will arrive at LaGuardia. You will have helicopters pick us up. We will fly straight to the show. We will perform immediately, and then we will be flown out.' And I picked up the phone and called Western Union ... And [my telegram] said: 'For reasons I can't go into / Until you are here / Clarifying your situation / Knowing you are having problems / You will have to find / Other transportation / Unless you plan not to come.'" The first letter of each line in the telegram spelled out an acrostic making clear that Iron Butterfly was not welcome.[68]

The Rascals were invited to play the festival but declined due to the fact that they were in the middle of recording a new album.
When feelers were sent out to The Beatles about possibly appearing, it was also suggested that a recent signee to their label Apple Records should also get an invite. That artist was James Taylor. When the group declined their invitation Taylor's invite was withdrawn as well.

Allegedly, The Rolling Stones were also sent an invitation, but declined because Mick Jagger was in Australia filming Ned Kelly, and Keith Richards' girlfriend Anita Pallenberg had just given birth to their son Marlon.
Media coverage