It was 1969. Woodstock revolutionized the way we experience music. Against a backdrop of unrest and widespread disillusionment with the government and its war that frivolously took so many young lives, it was yet a year that nonetheless gave back.
Opening the Woodstock festival itself, Sri Swami Satchidananda, fresh from Indian soil, addressed a crowd of about half a million people… extolling the virtues and power of music to bring peace to a war-torn world:
…through the music, we can work wonders. Music is a celestial sound and it is the sound that controls the whole universe, not atomic vibrations. Sound energy, sound power, is much, much greater than any other power in this world. Even in the war-field, to make the tender heart an animal, sound is used.
Artist Peter Max invited the Yogi over, feeling that America was ready for a new way of thinking. And on the the west coast, Yogi Bhajan, also newly arrived from India, gave his first talk on American soil. Indeed, America was ready for Indian mysticism.
Fifty Years After 