Inside the 2013 Newport Folk Festival

Updated

NEWPORT, R.I. — The Newport Folk Festival blew into the disgustingly picturesque coastal town over the weekend, transforming Fort Adams State Park into a happy hipster-haven filled with beards, booze and plenty of tattoos.

The three-day music festival featured emerging folk acts (like the Lone Bellow, Lord Huron and the Lumineers), genre-bending rockers (like Jim James, Feist and Beck) and the occasional folk legend (like 81-year-old Ramblin' Jack Elliott, who shared the stage with Beck for an impromptu duet).

It has become perhaps the only major American music festival in which the music onstage is often matched by the magic off it. Beck's festival-closing set on Sunday, on the main stage overlooking Newport Harbor, concluded with a transcendent version of "Sunday Sun" — just as the sun was setting.

Like other awe-inspiring moments in Newport Folk Festival history, it wasn't planned that way. It just sorta happened.

Click here to stream many of the performances via NPR.