Jonathan R. Wynn’s piece, the Music/City, makes light of how festivals in Austin, Nashville, and Newport benefit their respective communities in which they take place.  Wynn claims the festivals present an opportunity for large groups of strangers to converge and commune, while at the same time operate as a walled off an inclusive space (7).  Wynn suggests these festivals/communities, instantaneous in nature, perform as an “occasional public or an arranged public” (9).  This idea of an “occasional or arranged public” brings me to the question that I posed to the class, “Does this process of festivalization lead to spontaneous cosmopolitan canopies or offer spaces that mimic the traits of a cosmopolitan canopy?”

As a class, we seemed to come to a consensus that although these festivals displayed aspects that could be attributed to spontaneous cosmopolitan canopies, these festivals at best mimicked some of the defining characteristics of what might constitute a spontaneous cosmopolitan canopy. Wynn alludes to Anderson’s theory of a spontaneous community claiming cultural individuals, organizations, musicians, government/quasi – government entities, for profit entities, as well as audiences and communities converge within the space of the festival.  This illustrates that the festival is not only a neutral space that no one group exclusively owns, but there is also a common link amongst the audience in that they have all come to watch the same or different bands/musicians play (36).

It becomes apparent, upon examining Wynn’s research, that although the festivals appear to function in theory as spontaneous canopies (as Anderson would suggest), under the surface one can see these festivals mimic a spontaneous cosmopolitan canopy rather than truly functioning as one.  Wynn mentions all the major festivals that have been established sold out faster in recent time than they ever have, even before lineups are announced (40).  With limits of the potential for locals of the community to participate in the festival, it can create an exclusive space within an existing area (such as a park or square) of a community that is not accessible to all.  This is reminiscent of Anderson’s description of the poor in the Reading Terminal and most similar to Kevin Loughran’s theory of the High Line as a product of the growth machine and uneven development of urban spaces.  The concept of the city as a growth machine is echoed in Wynn’s research as he points out Mayor Wynn claimed that audiences had to spend money to make his city a thriving one, and that progressing urban culture requires economic sources (12).

This requirement of human capital to participate does not limit a spontaneous cosmopolitan canopy from occurring if everyone can purchase a ticket; however, it backfires when tickets sell out before lineups are announced and as a result “long brewing tensions between the festivals and their local communities exist” (40).  This exclusivity prevents a spontaneous cosmopolitan canopy from occurring due to the lack of a neutral space that it fails to produce.  Space is dominated by a large like-minded majority possibly there for different bands/musicians; not all groups are present as some are inherently excluded through economic capital i.e. festival tickets.

Justin, toward the end of our class discussion, made a great point describing the festivals as pop- up shops.  Interested people go in, interconnect in some way out of a shared interest in the shop, but they have to be there to see it, creating a sense of shared experience and not necessarily a spontaneous cosmopolitan canopy.  Justin’s point is very similar to David Grazian’s theory of a community as ambient, or the feeling of belonging arising through one’s participation around/among like-minded strangers.  This theory does not necessarily support the idea of a spontaneous cosmopolitan canopy occurring within the festivals, but rather a sense of a shared experience arising.

I would agree with this concept.  Festivals foster ambient communities rather than spontaneous cosmopolitan canopies as ambient communities.  Spontaneous cosmopolitan canopies have aspects of shared experience.  Those who participate in the experience do not have to engage in folk ethnography, as they would in a cosmopolitan canopy, because they are surrounded by like-minded individuals and not different groups.