Going The Distance

I first stumbled onto a music festival-sponsored 5K race by accident. On a humid June morning in 2013 at Manchester, Tenn.'s Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival, I went out for a run, rounded a corner and came upon a group of festival goers safety-pinning paper race numbers to their clothes, very possibly hungover or sleep-deprived , but nonetheless motivated enough to rouse themselves from sleep and run 3.1 miles at 9 am, several hours before the day's first performances were scheduled to start. Glad to have found company, I slipped into the herd just before someone shouted, "Go!"

This was the inaugural Roo Run, a ramble around dirt roads that bisect the festival grounds. As we cut through the campgrounds, sneakers kicking up dust, we drew bewildered looks from people yawning and rubbing their eyes in the Porta-Pottie lines. One guy poked his head out of his tent and groaned, "If you stop running, I'll give you beer." I didn't see anyone take him up on the offer.

Here was a significant divide, between those craving exertion and those who preferred a more leisurely experience. The runners had seized the opportunity to push themselves physically at a festival that wasn't really designed for that. Energized by the group's impetuousness, I surged to the finish line, pausing to down a paper cup's worth of water before I trotted away.

In the nearly half-century since Woodstock established a muddy, chaotically utopian prototype for rock and roll gatherings, the festival landscape has evolved in multiple directions. At this point, it's taken for granted that industry behemoths like Bonnaroo, Coachella, Lollapalooza, Governors Ball and Sasquatch will pack their lineups with so many varieties of nostalgia-stoking vintage superstars, current hitmakers, buzz acts and indie curiosities that there will be something for everyone, every year. That one-size-fits-all model places reliably low demands on festival goers, who can graze their ways across the musical menu, consuming whatever they wish. Flexible expectations translate to generalized satisfaction. But people with the means to shell out for VIP packages can expect to be able to insulate themselves from the inconveniences of being outdoors altogether. With luxuries like hot tubs, cabanas and air conditioning at their disposal, they can to avoid the crowds, beat the heat and party in considerable comfort.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, the last couple of decades have seen an explosion in the number of festivals that cater to narrower niches, starting with Afropunk's celebration of idiosyncratic black artistry, Warped Tour's mall punk appeal, Stagecoach's exclusively countrified lineup, Pickathon's focus on environmental sustainability and countless others. Attending thesemore of a commitment.