As the first performer at the Woodstock festival in 1969, Havens held the crowd for nearly three hours. Havens had been asked to continue playing because many artists scheduled to perform after him were delayed in reaching the festival location with highways at a virtual standstill. He was called back for several encores. Having run out of tunes, he improvised a song based on the old spiritual "Motherless Child" that became "Freedom". In an interview with Cliff Smith, for Music-Room, he explained:

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