Shutterbug Leni Sinclair: Music, Counterculture And Light

Bob Seger, John Sinclair Freedom Rally, on December 10, 1971.

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now...it’s so corporate and you are so restricted. If things had been like that back in the 60s and 70s, I wouldn’t be who I am.

Leni Sinclair , U.S.A.

Date Posted: 09/28/07

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Why do I love photography? I really don’t know how to answer that. I love music, I love musicians and I just happened to have a camera when I first started going to see bands and enjoying musicians on the stage. When you have a camera, it’s like you can get close to the musicians without them seeing you. I’m not a good photographer when it comes to me asking someone, “Can I take your picture?” I don’t like doing this, but anybody on stage, in the limelight, is fair game.

View Leni Sinclair's Photo Essay.

All photos copyright Leni Sinclair.

Photographing musicians give you access to the bands. For instance, if you get a good picture, the next time the band plays, you go there and show them the picture and they go, “Ooh, ahhh…Can we get a copy?” They even want to use it for publicity or to put it in the newspaper, you know. They get to know you, you get to know them, and the next time you get in free, and they let you take their picture.

It’s different now because photo access is so hard, it’s so corporate and you are so restricted. If things had been like that back in the 60s and 70s, I wouldn’t be who I am. I wouldn’t have all these pictures. Things were much freer then for a photographer.

Bob Seger – John Sinclair Freedom Rally, 1971

I took my first picture of Bob Seger in 1971. It was at the John Sinclair Freedom Rally on December 13, 1971 at the Crisler Arena. We had organized this concert to draw attention to John Sinclair for being in jail for two and a half years for the possession of two marijuana cigarettes. Bob Seger was supposed to be the headliner, and it was going to be all Michigan bands participating. Then through the miracle of divine intervention, John Lennon heard about the concert and agreed to be the headliner. At that point, the whole nature of it changed.

John Lennon And Yoko Ono – New York, 1972

The John Sinclair Freedom Rally was the pivotal point in John Lennon’s and Yoko Ono’s life and career. After the concert was such a smashing success and opened John Sinclair’s jail doors three days after the rally, John Lennon was overjoyed and started planning more concerts like that.