Ryan Cormier | The News Journal

Jenna Miller, The News Journal

After attending four straight years of the Firefly Music Festival starting in 2014, Millville's Bob Kozlowski decided to skip the Dover show this weekend.

He was underwhelmed with the lineup when he went in 2017, so the music fan skipped last year for the same reason.

"Growing up in Delaware, I was excited that something like Firefly came here and I was sure I was going to go every year once I experienced it," says Kozlowski, 54, a firefighter for Anne Arundel County in Maryland.

"I love the festival experience, too, but I couldn't justify that kind of money for bands I'm not interested in seeing," he adds. "And I realize it's for a younger generation, but I'm kind of angry. I thought this was going to be my every year thing from now on since it's my home state, but there's nothing for me anymore."

Jenna Miller/ Delaware News Journal

Firefly was founded on rock 'n' roll with Jack White, The Black Keys and The Killers headlining its inaugural year in 2012. In recent years, it has beefed up pop, rap and electronic dance music acts, targeting younger music fans.

As a result, the festival that was once a place to see a multi-generational crowd, complete with families and their teen children attending together, has morphed largely into a party for high school and college kids.

In its early years, Firefly's newness was overpowering, as was the festival's promise to bring a constant stream of national acts to the state — something Delaware had never seen before. Whether you were a 50-year-old rock head or a 17-year-old raver, Firefly was yours.

While the wow factor of Firefly has dissipated over the past eight years, its musical bookings seem to be what's changed the most, pushing out older fans and encouraging more baby-faced party-starters.

KYLE GRANTHAM/THE NEWS JOURNAL

Recent lineups haven't been able to match the drawing power of the 90,000 who came to see Paul McCartney in 2015 and 80,000 for Foo Fighters in 2014. (Firefly crowd sizes in years since have seemingly averaged about two-thirds as many people, although exact figures were not released.)

But all of this doesn't mean Firefly is as tired as a festival-goer on their third day.

It's still the most high-energy event held in Delaware each year, rivaled in size only by the Delaware State Fair, which will celebrate its 100th anniversary in Harrington next month.

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It's hip enough to bring Ben Southern, 20, and Brandi Thompson, 19, both of Point Pleasant, New Jersey, across the Delaware Memorial Bridge.

They came to see hip hop acts Travis Scott and Brockhampton. What do they think of the festival's lone rock headliner, Panic! at the Disco, a band formed in 2004?

Acts like that were booked as a way to cater to "older crowds," they said.

Jenna Miller/ Delaware News Journal

Firefly director Stephanie Mezzano, who has been with the festival from the beginning, has guided it from its Red Frog Events founding to its current ownership.

At the time of last year's sale to AEG, she told The News Journal that the festival would feel fresh in 2019, adding, "Music festivals are ever-changing and we need to evolve and continue to innovate if we want to stay at the top."

Music fan Keith Jeffery, 49, has attended every Firefly until this year. He's not into the evolution.

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Firefly 2019: On the scene Friday

He calls the 2019 lineup a "joke" with this year's headliners of Post Malone, Travis Scott and Panic! at the Disco. And after seeing fewer bands he likes and fewer familiar faces in the crowd in recent years, he bowed out for the festival's eighth iteration.

"I don't know if the bands are getting bad or I'm getting old, but it's just not my thing anymore," says Jeffery, of Newark. "It used to have a little bit of everything, but now they are focusing on one crowd more and more each year and they are a lot younger."

Each year, Jeffery would look up the bands playing the festival on iTunes and find 20 to 25 acts he was excited to see. This year, he found seven that he would "maybe" like.

"When I saw that, I knew I was done. It's the worst lineup of any festival I've seen this year," says Jeffery. He'll use the money he would have spent at Firefly in the Caribbean this summer for his 50th birthday.

Milford's Jordan Walls, 30, hasn't even considered returning to Firefly after attending its first four years.

KYLE GRANTHAM/THE NEWS JOURNAL

"I don’t mean to come off crotchety, but the younger audience, focus on EDM and rising prices really wore me out," says Walls, who works for a dental supply manufacturer. "It seems Firefly has completely cut off the audience that had been with them since the beginning."

Firefly crowds still include some music fans in their 30s, 40s and 50s, even if they are muttering "Damn, I feel old" to themselves. But a walk around the festival grounds shows they are wildly outnumbered by younger fans.

In fact, Gov. John Carney said earlier this week that he hoped some of those young fans would fall in love with Delaware, and that the festival would help draw more tech-savvy millennials to work and live in the state.

No matter their age, the crowd at Firefly still has one goal: party with friends and have fun. And that hasn't changed over the years. But who they're having fun with has changed a bit.

Jenna Miller/ Delaware News Journal

You're more likely to get lost in Friday night's EDM DJ Zedd's intense glow stick-assisted light show than a see a father and daughter sway together singing the songs of McCartney or the late Tom Petty as they had in the past.

Almost as if Firefly was putting an exclamation point on its changes, the festival this year ditched its tented, off-the-beaten-path Pavilion stage where most techno acts have played in recent years.

Instead, Firefly debuted a new Prism stage, a bigger space for EDM acts, in the same place its main stage stood during its first years.

In those earlier years, you could find Wilmington musician Tony Cappella (Montana Wildaxe, Stone Shakers) roaming Firefly's grounds with a drink in hand. He was there in 2015 and 2016 after missing its first few years and hearing good things. McCartney being there made it a must-attend event for him.

But he noticed the beginnings of Firefly's shift when, the year after McCartney performed, the festival returned with Mumford & Sons, Kings of Leon, Florence and the Machine and deadmau5 as headliners.

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Firefly 2019: On the scene Saturday

"I just felt very, very old. I was out. It just didn't appeal to me, especially at that cost," says Cappella, 60, who estimates the weekend of fun with VIP passes cost a total of $3,500.

Global entertainment company AEG Presents, which also runs California's Coachella festival, purchased Firefly from founders Red Frog Events last year. That deal came four years after AEG was brought on as a partner to help promote and produce the festival, slowly shifting the fest's musical focus.

In its early years, it seemed that everyone in the state knew when Firefly was being held. It was like a circus was coming to town. A Delaware who's who could be found there from Gov. Jack Markell and his family to former DuPont CEO Ellen Kullman.

These days, some of the same people offer a look of sympathy instead of envy when they hear you’re going to Firefly.

Jerry Habraken, The News Journal

In the heady first years, going to the festival and having a hotel room meant you had to beat away friends-turned-room crashers. Not so much this year or last year.

Softer lineups, premium three-day pass prices ($319 for general admission and $699 for VIP), and pricey food and drinks just haven't seemed to draw First State music fans.

Live music fan Lee Hoover, who says her age is somewhere between "50 and death," went to Firefly the first two years, drawn by the huge festival's genre diversity in her backyard. As a Dover resident, she had to check it out.

Flash forward several years.

"There are only five performers this year on the entire list that I've heard of and I'm sure for many people that list is even shorter," she says.

Jenna Miller/ Delaware News Journal

She's not going, and she wonders what Firefly planners are shooting for.

"The fest with the longest band list even though no one's heard of them?" she asks. "The one that most alienates people over a certain age? The one that charges the mostest money for the furthest distance to walk for leastest quality of music?"

Millville's Kozlowski has found a nearby alternative. He's in Ocean City, Maryland, where he found another music festival to attend that's more to his liking: the much smaller three-day Jellyfish Festival.

He's saving money, getting a taste of a festival experience and will hear at least one national act he's familiar with, which would have been tough for him to do at this year's Firefly.

He knows it won't be as magical as Firefly.

"At least I won't be wasting my weekend," Kozlowski says. "Jellyfish Festival is mostly local bands, but Styx will be there, so I'll enjoy that."

Maddy Lauria contributed to this article. Got a tip? Contact Ryan Cormier of The News Journal at rcormier@delawareonline.com or (302) 324-2863. Follow him on Facebook (@ryancormier), Twitter (@ryancormier) and Instagram (@ryancormier).

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