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Wanderlust makes music

The four-day event will feature an eclectic array of musical acts, along with headliner Moby
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serene sounds Trombone Shorty is one of several musical acts performing in Whistler as part of the Wanderlust festival from Aug. 1 - 4. Photo by Kirk Edwards, submitted

Wanderlust, the travelling yoga, music and lifestyle festival, is returning to Whistler Aug. 1 – 4 for its second year.

With hundreds of yoga sessions, lectures, hikes and concerts, the offerings can be a little overwhelming and, to the uninitiated, slightly confusing. Basically, says co-founder Jeff Krasno, you will see passholders toting their yoga mats all around town, but there will also be free concerts and yoga events, along with reasonably priced shows by musical acts like Moby.

Pique caught up with Krasno over the phone days before the kick off to talk more about how organizers choose the lineup, which are the must-see acts and how the heck they decided to combine music and yoga in the first place.

For a complete schedule visit www.wanderlustfestival.com.

Pique: How did you choose the musical acts this year?

Jeff Krasno: There's a mix of criteria we look for. The first one is after doing yoga and hiking and going to lectures during the day, we found people really want to dance at night. We try to find music that's conducive to people moving their bodies. We tend to have a group of people who are fairly gifted with their bodies in one way or another... We also try to find musicians that align with the underlying ideals of the event. Last year we had Michael Franti. He's a yogi and he not only gave a big concert performance, but also accompanied (yoga instructor) Seane Corn... Moby has been on tour for most of the summer. He's really invested in the event. He does an incredible DJ show at night. On Sunday, he ends the festival with a touching acoustic show with a violinist that couldn't be more different than his DJ show. He also manages to give a lecture in there and he's taking yoga classes throughout the day. The (other) criterion is a discovery element. For example, this year we have a band from Paris called Caravan Palace. They're just like one of the best live bands in the world in my opinion. People are coming for the overall experience. It gives us the ability to surprise people and discover things.

Pique: That's interesting. So you have more freedom with the music lineup because it's not the main draw?

JK: From the beginning we never wanted to be headliner-dependent where it's like if we didn't book Radiohead then, oh no, will we be able to have the festival? It is very liberating from a promoter's point of view, to some degree, to have that liberty to curate and let people discover and hope that people are showing up for the overall experience because they trust Wanderlust. It sort of speaks to a little bit of Wanderlust's development in the first place. It was founded by my partner Sean (Hoess) and I, who came from the music business, and my wife Schuyler (Grant), who is a yoga teacher and owns a number of successful yoga studios in New York. We combined our strengths and connections to put on Wanderlust.

Pique: In what capacity did you and Sean work in the music business?

JK: We ran a company called Velour Music Group. It's music management company and a label. It's still a part of our business. Wanderlust has become a beast. But through that we were going to festivals forever. Some of our really good friends started and ran some of the biggest North American festivals. We were going to Bonnaroo, Austin City Limits and Lollapalooza from the beginning. We had insider knowledge of how they got put together. But the experience got a little old for us. We started imagining a more participatory festival where you have a schedule and you can choose these classes and be part of the event as a participant.

Pique: How does Wanderlust work in terms of tickets? Can the public go to individual concerts?

JK: One of the things that we really, really try to do is integrate music into the yoga classes. We'll have a huge variety of different venues for yoga. In those venues there's live musicians and DJ set ups. There are a couple of premiere free yoga events at Olympic Plaza on Friday and Saturday at 4 p.m.... In the evening there are shows Thursday, Friday and Saturday night and Sunday afternoon. Then we have some later shows starting at 10 p.m. at the convention centre. It's $10 Friday night for Quixotic and $20 on Saturday for Moby. We just want people to come. There's so much going on here. It's a very different event for us because at some of the other resorts, we just four-wall the events. When we show up it's Wanderlust and nothing else going on. In Whistler, we're new here, we're like, 'Hey! We're over here!'"

Pique: Tell me about some of the music acts.

JK: We have an artist on the festival whose name is Trombone Shorty. He's not very short and he doesn't play a trombone. He mostly plays trumpet. He's from New Orleans and he takes New Orleans tradition and melts it into a modern sensibility. He's just an incredibly dynamic performer. I think finding diversity is pretty important. We have that one side then on the other on Friday night is a group called Quixotic. It's this sort of light projection, modern dance DJ ensemble. They're combining absolutely stunning costuming and almost Cirque du Soleil-style dancers with DJ culture and modern projection mapping. It's unique and really beautiful... We're programming around things we think will be interesting and diverse.