The brains behind Bonnaroo talk about their early days in New Orleans, promoting music festivals, and the perks of doing what they love for a living.
Anointed "the American rock festival to end all festivals" by Rolling Stone, Bonnaroo makes its 10th appearance this month. Every year, 75,000 to 85,000 fans swarm to a Tennessee farm, where they pitch tents and spend four days grooving to acts both emerging and emerged. (This year's lineup includes Eminem, Arcade Fire, and Neil Young.) Bonnaroo, recently enshrined as a Ben & Jerry's flavor, accounts for about 25 percent of revenue for the New York City—based events and marketing company Superfly Presents. The $40 million company was co-founded by four young men desperate to avoid the finance and accounting careers for which their college studies had seemingly predestined them. They are Kerry Black (graphic design), Rick Farman (festival operations), Richard Goodstone (marketing), and Jonathan Mayers (programming).
Jonathan Mayers: Three of us were in college in New Orleans. I graduated first, in 1995, and got a job booking talent at Tipitina's, which is this legendary R&B/jazz/rock/funk/you-name-it uptown club. Rick and Kerry joined Tipitina's while still students at Tulane.
Rick Farman: I had promoted bands in high school on Long Island. In New Orleans, Tipitina's was my favorite place. I walked into Jon's office and said, "Let me help you."
Kerry Black: I was a friend of Rick's and had a car, so they hired me, too.
Farman: We did it all: picked up bands at the airport, arranged the catering, plastered fliers around the city. We were in it for the free shows and the concert posters. That was all we cared about.
Mayers: Tipitina's was sold, so we decided to strike out on our own. I started working in the production office of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival—that's JazzFest. Rich was a high school friend. He quit his advertising job in New York and moved down to help. We planned to stage shows in clubs and theaters and on riverboats during major city events. JazzFest, for example, runs until 7 p.m. over two weekends. That means tens of thousands of music lovers are looking for something to do in the evenings. We also targeted Mardi Gras. The whole town wants to party then, but a lot of locals would rather avoid the chaos on Bourbon Street.
Farman: We had $20,000, most of it borrowed from family; I still had my bar mitzvah money.
Mayers: We got the name Superfly from the Curtis Mayfield movie soundtrack. You know: "Oooh, Super Fly/ You're gonna make your fortune by and by." It sounded cool.
Farman: Our first event was a concert during Mardi Gras. We'd developed artist relationships at Tipitina's and JazzFest, so we were able to book acts like the Meters and Maceo Parker.
Black: It was the thing to do at Tulane. The theme was "Take Funk to Heaven—Mardi Gras '97."
Farman: We rented a space called the Contemporary Arts Center—basically an empty warehouse. We had just one key and one cell phone. So in the midst of setting up stages and sound equipment, booking acts and advertising, we ran around handing off the key and the phone to one another.
Richard Goodstone: The police picked me up for stapling fliers to telephone poles. It was a combination of that and not having an ID on me.
Mayers: There were gaping holes in the roof. On the day of the concert, we realized it was going to pour, so we bought sandbags to pile up in front of the stage. We got lucky—the rain came pouring down on the stage right after the band had left. We sold out and made a $10,000 profit. We put the money in a safe and slept next to it until the bank opened.
Farman: Kerry and I graduated, and Jon quit JazzFest to work on Superfly full time. We operated almost like a socialist regime. Every month, each one of us would list personal expenses—a car payment, new contact lenses—and take exactly that amount from earnings. The rest went back into the business. We were good at making combinations of bands. We'd get an amazing jazz artist to open for a rock 'n' roll band or a New Orleans band to open for a national hip-hop artist. Then we started getting individual musicians from different groups to play in all-star bands for one-time events. We were recruiting stars like Police drummer Stewart Copeland, Primus bassist Les Claypool, and Phish guitarist Trey Anastasio, who came together as Oysterhead. Oysterhead went on to record and tour together. But the first time they performed was for us.
Mayers: We had to program creatively, because the competition was tough. Clear Channel was rolling up independent concert promoters, which gave it a lot of clout with musicians' agents. House of Blues had its own performance venues, so it could hang on to all the merchandise and concession sales. We couldn't. In 2001, 10 shows in a row lost money. We'd hit the ceiling financially and creatively and needed a new direction.
Farman: The jam scene, which was our specialty, was also at a crossroads. Jerry Garcia was dead, and Phish was on hiatus. Bands were starting to figure out the Internet. Part of it was the whole Grateful Dead ethos of tape trading. So all of a sudden, bands are realizing, This is a way I can communicate with my audience, and the fans are realizing, This is a way I can access music. We wanted to build on those existing communities.
Mayers: We took a break and went to California for Coachella, the music and art festival. That rejuvenated us, and we came home with a new business model. It would be a multiday music and entertainment event where the audience would camp out. We would control all the revenue streams: tickets, concessions, merchandise, VIP packages, sponsorships, and licensing of audio and video content.
