Ashley Capps sits in the front seat of a three-bench golf cart as he is driven around the general admission camping area of the Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival, which opened Thursday in Manchester, Tennessee.
He is being driven by Ken Weinstein, the man with Big Hassle Media who has overseen media relations with the festival since the beginning. Behind Weinstein are festival co-founders Capps and Rick Farman. Capps' AC Entertainment out of Knoxville and Farman's Superfly in New York conceived the idea of hosting a massive, multiday, live music, arts and camping festival in the middle of Tennessee nearly 20 years ago.
Today, Capps and Farman are riding around seeing the results of their vision and even they express some surprise and satisfaction at what has become the largest festival in North America. On Wednesday, they are looking over at the changes to the site in general, but general admission camping in particular.
Farman is explaining Bonnaroo's place in the changing musical landscape since it first exploded onto the landscape, literally, in 2002. Specifically, he is softening the idea that Bonnaroo might have saved live music by not only proving that large festivals could work in North America, but that people were hungry to discover music not found in traditional formats such as radio or what the major labels tell them is good.
"Put in context, it might be coincidence that we came along around the time of the digital music explosion," Farman says. "Also, people were ready to accept the idea of going to an event and fully immersing themselves in it."
He then holds up his cell phone, and points out the role it has had in how people listen to and discover new music. At this point, Capps turns around and says, "I think what Rick is trying to say is that we invented the internet."
The three have a good laugh, pointing out that the internet was indeed invented in Tennessee, but not by "that other Tennessean," former Vice President Al Gore, who critics have teased for purportedly claiming to have helped create the online universe.
It's a light moment for the men. It's early afternoon on The Farm, as the Great Stage Park is informally called by regular attendees, and the place is populated by workers and volunteers getting ready for the influx of nearly 70,000 people. The fields that make up the general admission camping area are empty, save for the lush green grass. They will start coming in around 3 p.m. when officials start admitting people. They will be full of people, cars, tents, lawn chairs and tarps.
That 70,000 number is a guess, as Bonnaroo doesn't release actual numbers, but it has said that 80,000 tickets sold represents a sellout. Attendance was way down in 2016, with some sources reporting that decline to have been as much as 45 percent.
Both Capps and Farman dispute that, saying "A lot of those reports were considerably off."
The crowds returned last year, and Capps says he expects this year's audience to be similar to 2017. The 2016 year, both men agree, was part of the ebb and flow of doing business over many years.
"This is our 17th year," Farman says.
"We can't take that for granted. There are not that many things, especially festivals, that can say that. And, rarer still, it is still vibrant, still changing and still growing. That is very gratifying."
Contact Barry Courter at bcourter@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6354.