Bonnaroo at 15: The Masterminds Behind the Festival

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My first experience at Bonnaroo was the night that William Hung did that thing. We had just set up camp after waiting in line for about ten hours or so and started to head to the middle when we saw a bunch of dudes dressed up like Roman soldiers carrying around a throne with William Hung sitting atop of it. I believe the Dirty Dozen Brass Band was playing and there were girls on stilts and the like. Total circus. They started way back in the upper right hand corner of the map and as they went towards Centeroo they picked up a bunch of folks so it turned in to a parade (of course). They opened up a separate entrance for the parade to go in to so we didn't have to wait in line, but it was still crowded so one of the girls on stilts fell down. I ran up to help her up but she told me that it would take several people to get her back up and that we would all have to work together to do it. So amidst the chaos, she very told a handful of us precisely what to do even though none of us had ever met each other. We got her up on the first try and laughed like crazy and followed a bit further where the band got on stage and played for a few hours. That was Thursday of 2004 and I had never experienced anything like it, so I became a pretty big fan of the whole deal, really.