Bonnaroo co-founder Jonathan Mayers dies aged 51, days before 2025 festival

Mayers also helped start Outside Lands and worked on a series of immersive experiences based on television shows

Jonathan Mayers at a press conference for the Great Googa Mooga Festival in New York in 2012 (Getty)

Jonathan Mayers, who helped create a number of major American festivals, including Bonnaroo and Outside Lands, has died. He was 51.

Bonnaroo started in 2002, and the 2025 edition is set to begin in Manchester, Tennessee, this week on Thursday, June 12.

No cause of death has yet been announced.

In a statement to Billboard, Red Light Management founder Coran Capshaw said: “This is incredibly tough news for so many of us. Jon was the creative force behind so much of what people experience at Bonnaroo, Outside Lands, and many other events over the years. We’re all really going to miss him.”

Mayers graduated in 1995 from Tulane University in New Orleans, where he became interested in concert promotion through his work at legendary local venue Tipitina’s and the city’s long-running Jazz Fest.

The following year, he co-founded Superfly with partners Rick Farman, Richard Goodstone and Kerry Black, and the fledgling promotions company hosted their first concert during Mardi Gras.

The four worked together to launch Bonnaroo in 2002 after securing the festival site on farmland in Manchester, an hour outside of Nashville. They worked closely with Capshaw’s Red Light Management and other industry figures to book headliners, including the Grateful Dead’s Phil Lesh and Bob Weir.

In 2008, Mayers partnered with Another Planet Entertainment to create the Outside Lands festival in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park.

As well as music festivals, Mayers also partnered with television shows to create “immersive” fan experiences based on series including Friends, Seinfeld, The Office, South Park, Arrested Development, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia and The Daily Show.

Mayers left Superfly acrimoniously in 2021, and the following year sued his former partners Farman, Goodstone and Black, accusing them of civil misrepresentation, breach of contract and fraud. Mayers alleged that they had misrepresented the value of his shares in the promotions company. The lawsuit was dismissed in 2023.

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Superfly said in a statement to Billboard: “We are heartbroken with the passing of Jonathan. He was a cherished part of Superfly’s story, woven into it’s history and legacy. In addition to the role he’s played in bringing joy to millions, we will miss his razor sharp wit, infectious smile and contagious laugh. No one could light up a room like Jon.”

In the years following his departure from Superfly, Mayers worked on the Core City Detroit project to raise money for the city’s regeneration.

This year’s Bonnaroo will see headline performances from the likes of Tyler, the Creator, Olivia Rodrigo and Hozier.

Dayglo Presents founder Peter Shapiro said in a statement that contemporary festivals owe a debt to Mayers’s work behind the scenes.

“Jonathan was one of the true real visionaries of the modern concert world and one of the core minds behind Bonnaroo,” Shapiro told Billboard. “Modern-day festivals are all in some way built off of his vision.”