Woodstock 50 festival lineup announced; headliners include The Killers, Miley Cyrus, Jay-Z, Dead & Company

Headliners include Miley Cyrus, the Killers, Santana and Jay-Z

Move over Jimi, Chili Peppers, and Kid Rock; the full lineup for this summer’s Woodstock 50 festival has been announced. Scheduled for August 16-18 in Watkins Glen, the festival is promoter Michael Lang’s anniversary event marking the original Aquarian Festival from 1969, previously commemorated with a 1994 festival in Saugerties and a 1999 event in Rome, NY. 

The event will have three stages and three smaller “neighborhoods,” each with their own food and programming and “glamping” opportunities. Tickets will go on sale on April 22, Earth Day.

Woodstock 50 isn’t the only one to commemorating the festival’s 50th anniversary: There will also be concerts at the original site in Bethel. Not one to play favorites, Santana will be playing both.

The lineups include:

Day 1: Friday, August 16

The Killers, Miley Cyrus, Santana, The Lumineers, The Raconteurs, Robert Plant and the Sensational Space Shifters, Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats, John Fogerty, Run the Jewels, The Head and the Heart, Maggie Rogers, Michael Franti & Spearhead, Bishop Briggs, Anderson East, Akon, Princess Nokia, John Sebastian, Melanie, Grandson, Fever 333, Doroty, Flora Cash, Larkin Poe, Brian Cadd, Ninet Tayeb, and more.

Day 2: Saturday, August 17

Dead & Company, Chance the Rapper, The Black Keys, Sturgell Simpson, Greta Van Fleet, Portugal. The Man, Leon Bridges, Gary Clark Jr., Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, David Crosby and Friends, Dawes, Margo Price, Nahko and Medicine for the PEople, India.Arie, Jade Bird, Country Joe McDonald, Rival Sons, Emily King, Soccer Mommy, Sir, Taylor Bennett, Amy Helm, Courtney Hadwin, Pearl, John-Robert, IAMDDB, and more.

Day 3: Sunday, August 18

Jay-Z, Imagine Dragons, Halsey, Cage the Elephant, Brandi Carlile, Jannelle Monáe, Young the Giant, Courtney Barnett, Common, Vince Staples, Judah and the Lion, Earl Sweatshirt, boygenius, Reignwolf, The Zombies, Canned Heat, Hot Tuna, Pussy Riot, Cherry Glazerr, Leven Kali, The Marcus King Band, Victory, Hollis Brown, John Craigie, Amigo the Devil, Liz Brasher, and more.

Lang, a longtime Woodstock resident, noted that as much as the new and “legacy” acts that have been booked, he’s excited by the various nonprofits who’ll be on hand, from the ecologically-focused to voter registration efforts, Hiring America and Parkland, Florida’s March For Our Lives mission to end gun violence.

Speaking on Wednesday, 20 hours after his festival lineup’s official release, Lang said that he’d be commuting between his rented offices in the former Hawthorne Gallery on Elwyn Lane to Watkins Glen until late July, when new offices would be set up out there. As for local tie-ins between his hometown and the commemoration of what helped make the town extra-famous 50 years back, the impresario added that although most of his tech crews are lined up already, “we may still be hiring help for the office here.” And in addition to locals John Sebastian and Amy Helm, Lang said that students from Woodstock’s Rock Academy would be playing. “And that’s an exclusive,” he added.