24–27 June 1971
The Celebration of Life, held in June of 1971, brought well over 60,000 attendees from across the United States to McCrea, Louisiana—a small crossroads town situated along the Atchafalaya River.
While festival planners initially promoted a wide array of musical acts and attractions, several adverse factors—including local uproar, an expensive legal battle, and the disruptive summer weather common to southern Louisiana—wreaked havoc on the eight-day schedule of events.
Musical performances, which included Chuck Berry and Stephen Stills, took place overnight. During the day, festival-goers faced shortages of food and water, intense heat with few shaded areas, and alleged brutality by police and festival security. There were several deaths at the Celebration of Life, including four drownings in the Atchafalaya.
Following in the wake of the Altamont Speedway Free Concert and the Powder Ridge Rock Festival—events similarly plagued by logistical difficulties and tragedy—the failed Celebration of Life marked the end of the golden age of late-1960s rock festival culture, which had been ushered in by the earlier commercial successes of the Monterey Pop Festival and Woodstock.