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MORE THAN 20 years ago, Richie Havens went from the streets ofBedford Stuyvesant to raise his raw baritone and rake his guitar inthe cafes of Greenwich Village. He was a fresh presence on the music scene, and his plaintive rendering of "Freedom / Motherless Child" at the Woodstock festival in 1969 remains a powerful moment in the film record of that historic gathering.
Like other folk artists who emerged during the heady '60s, Havens, now 44, has seen his visibility wane as rock, disco and other tastes have eclipsed acoustic music and relegated it to a specialized market. Some of his contemporaries, like Joan Baez, no longer have recording contracts, and there are fewer radio outlets for folk and folk-rock.
But Havens, a New York City resident, continues to perform around the country and in Europe. He's amused that anyone might wonder whatever happened to him, saying, "I'm still there, doing what I do."
Lately, the lanky performer has been busy on several fronts. Besides preparing to release his 15th album - the second one on his own Connexion label - he is coproducing a docudrama about a good friend, the late Jimi Hendrix, and he appears as a wandering interviewer in "A Matter of Struggle," an antiwar documentary that seeks to show a link between military spending and the suppression of human rights. And yes, that's Havens' grainy voice you hear on TV commercials.
"A Matter of Struggle" is a matter of concern to Havens. The independently made film recently had a brief run at a Manhattan theater. Havens, Pete Seeger and Gil Scott-Heron are due to appear at a benefit...