MUSIC FESTIVALS have changed considerably over the past decade. Once they were huge corporate beasts, famed for mud, bad food and even worse behavior. In recent years, they’ve grown more intimate— smaller, family-friendly boutique affairs offering gin bars, gourmet burgers and literary tents. Now a new generation of festivals is emerging, ones that are artist-led, collaborative and fiercely local.
GENRE THERAPY: Bryce Dessner, pictured, and his brother Aaron, below left, are rethinking the nature of festivals.
FROM LEFT: SHERVIN LAINEZ (2); ALLEN LANE; TIM STEELE/RENEE BRIDGES
At the heart of this revolution stand Aaron and Bryce Dessner of American band the National. Whether alone or together, the Dessner brothers have overseen a confounding array of musical gatherings, from MusicNOW in their native Cincinnati to New York’s Crossing Brooklyn Ferry, Boston Calling and Sounds From a Safe Harbour in Cork, Ireland. They worked with Bon Iver to create the Eaux Claires festival in Wisconsin and were an integral part of the Funkhaus festival in Berlin in October, where more than 80 musicians took over the abandoned studios of a former East German radio station for a weeklong melding of music, art, film and dance.