Format Festival 2022

FORMAT Festival planted its flag in the Ozarks in 2022, launching as one of the most ambitious festival debuts of the year. Held September 23-25 at the Sugar Creek Airstrip in Bentonville, Arkansas, the inaugural edition billed itself as a multidisciplinary playground where music, art, and technology collided across three days and roughly 40 artists.

The lineup was stacked. French synth-pop icons Phoenix, psych-groove favorites Khruangbin, and Australian dance titans RÜFÜS DU SOL topped the bill, joined by heavy-hitters The War on Drugs, Beach House, and The Flaming Lips. Deeper down, the curation flexed serious range: disco legend Nile Rodgers & CHIC, jazz pioneer Herbie Hancock, bassist Thundercat, UK collective Jungle, big-beat veteran Fatboy Slim, and Arkansas-bred blues phenom Christone “Kingfish” Ingram.

Set against large-scale art installations and immersive tech experiences, FORMAT positioned itself as more than a concert — it was pitched as a destination event for the culturally curious, and its debut cemented Bentonville as an unlikely festival hub. Browse the lineup and festival info below.