TenorCat:  Wow, we could talk for hours about those times and music.  I used to go the Keystone Corner in Palo Alto cuz I had moved to Santa Cruz in 1969.  Best show I saw there for sure was Freddy King, about 1972 or 1973.  I mean a great, great show.  My sister got on stage with him and did the bump with big Freddie.  There was a small club in Santa Cruz that hosted a lot of good shows (I think the club is now Moe's Alley Blues Club).  I saw James Cotton there a couple of times. 

When Bill Graham's office were firebombed by some pigs, I also thought the films were all destroyed, but the Vaultsters may blow us away some day with video on DVD's of these historically great shows.

I saw some good jazz in the city, but not as much as you.  Saw Archie Shepp wail one night.  For me, it was the black blues performers that rocked my world, so I concentrated on seeing them.  Like my description above recounts, it was Albert Kings' incredible stage presence that almost stole the show from Hendrix in the Feb '68 show.  When you see John Mayall and Mick Taylor play the blues, then Albert King on the same night in 1968, you see the difference.  I seemed to like the white performers on record more than live, and the black performers more live than recorded. 

My NYC mother saw the period of transition from big bands to be-bop.  Two interesting facts about that. Her father, my grandpa, played in the "first" big jazz band, Paul Whiteman's Orchestra.  Second is my mother was propositioned by Coleman Hawkins in his motel room after a show in Harlem. Yes, my mom was kind of wild (kind of a bohemian), but she turned The Hawk down. She said she was came to his room because she admired his music, not to sleep with him!

I feel the exact same way about large shows.  The old Fillmore held only 1,200, the Winterland about 3,200, and I have researched, but cannot find out the capacity of the Fillmore West (nee Carousel Ballroom) but my guess is about 2,500.  Day on the Green, with miniature performers a football field away?  Sometimes you were more engaged, like it or not, with the drunk/too stoned dudes and their girlfriends right around you (with their whistling and hooting).  I saw the Dead in 1967 (Continental Ballroom in Santa Clara) and did not like their "sloppy" play.  So I ignored them for a long time, then a girlfriend took me to their show at the Greek in Berkeley in 1980 and I got a whole new appreciation for them and for their followers.  You see, from them on, I went to Dead shows, about one per year, because the crowd reminded me of the 60's.  No pushing and shoving and lots of peace, love, and music ( and I think the Dead got a better in their later years, until about 1990 when Jerry's voice went to hell and his playing deterioated shortly thereafter).  Anyway, I live in Sacramento today, what about you?  I still go to as much live music as I can, but it has been curtailed by the birth of my first child (I know, I can do the math - I'll be 72, when she graduates from high school).   My last live show was two weeks ago --Mark Hummel's Blues Harmonica Blowout at the Palms in Winters with Rick Estrin, Paul Oscher (played with Muddy in the late 1960's), Billy Boy Arnold, and Rod Piazza.  

OK, I have written too much not about Jimi Hendrix in this forum.