Patti Smith will use her performance at Denmark’s famed Roskilde Festival to mark the tenth anniversary of the tragic deaths of nine music fans.
Smith and long time guitarist Lenny Kaye will commemorate the event before the music begins on the famous Orange Stage on the Thursday."Asking Patti Smith was an obvious choice. And to our delight, we received a reply from her within a few hours – she'd love to come and was very honoured to be asked," says the festival's music director Rikke Øxner.
"The accident also made a deep impression on her and so did the memory of a beautiful afternoon on Orange Stage in 2001 when 50,000 people rediscovered the meaning of life through the music."
When I was eighteen I travelled to Scandinavia with my trip climaxing at the Roskilde Festival the year of the accident. As part of the crowd for Pearl Jam that night I was close enough to witness the events unfold first hand.
The remainder of the festival was sombre, but positive and showed the Danish community spirit.
To my Danish friends, I am sorry I can't be there this year to mark this occasion with you but I will be thinking of you all next weekend.
I wish you all a very hygge festival! Vi ses i 2011.
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