This firm represents Kris Northern, professionally known as Phidelity, in regards to Imagine Music & Arts Festival's decision to prohibit him from performing based upon the allegation that he played music at an excessive volume.

The allegation is unsupported by the available evidence, appears to have been evaluated without any reliable sound measurement, and fails to account for the actual time, location, and character of the performance. More fundamentally, it reflects a mistaken premise that Mr. Northern was attempting to transform an early-morning ambient set into an unmitigated barn-burner. Our Client's 3.5-hour recording of his beatless ambient set (Exhibit A) provides evidence to the contrary.

The evidence will, unequivocally, show that at no point in the course of his set, nor the weekend, did our client attempt to... (ahermm) "rage it, bro."

Mr. Northern had completed his musical performance at approximately 5:30 a.m. The sun was coming up and the dome was still full of friends who had gathered to celebrate Christie's birthday. The main PA system had already been powered down by the sound engineer, who had concluded his duties and departed to hunt for letters at the end of the alphabet.

The song in question, "Lionel Richie - All Night Long," was performed on a single wedge monitor at 2/10 volume while Mr. Northern was packing his equipment. This is what has been retroactively characterized as a disturbance.

Earlier that same day, Mr. Leong personally informed Mr. Northern that the Festival intended to offer him a main stage performance the following year. By sunrise, that offer had been replaced with a ban of indefinite duration, communicated indirectly, and unaccompanied by any opportunity for discussion.

At approximately the two-hour mark of the performance, Mr. Leong personally visited the dome, was asked directly by Mr. Northern whether the volume level and music selection were acceptable, and confirmed that the performance was "perfect." Mr. Northern further inquired whether he should conclude the set at the previously agreed-upon time. Mr. Leong responded that if the performance continued at its current level, it could proceed.

That was the last Mr. Northern heard from him that evening.

Any subsequent characterization of the same performance as excessively loud is inconsistent with Mr. Leong's own assessment, delivered in person, at the venue, during the set.

There are two relevant recordings of the conclusion of Mr. Northern's performance.

The first (the "Guy Davis Video") captures front-of-house conditions as an ordinary attendee would have experienced them. On that recording, two sounds are plainly audible above our Client's music: the laughter of Mr. Elliot Rasenick and the speaking voice of the individual known as Meris.

Exhibit B-1: The Guy Davis Video

Sound level outside the dome; music barely audible. Elliot's laughter and the revelry inside are clearly louder than the music.

We do not raise this lightly. Mr. Rasenick's laugh is, by long and uncontested community consensus, a well-endowed utterance of cartoonish girth; Meris's voice is gentler still. That our Client's music sat beneath both on a recording made at the time is effectively dispositive of the volume question.

The second recording (the "Sound Booth Video") appears to be the basis for the Festival's position, and it should be disregarded. It was captured immediately adjacent to the stage monitor and therefore documents exaggerated volume and monitor bleed rather than the sound level experienced by the audience. To offer it as evidence of front-of-house volume is to mistake the wedge for the dome.

Exhibit B-2: The Sound Booth Video

Captured immediately adjacent to the stage monitor. Documents exaggerated volume and monitor bleed, not audience-area sound levels.

In the absence of calibrated measurements taken from a representative listening position, the Sound Booth Video has little or no probative value. The Guy Davis Video, by contrast, records the relevant acoustic environment directly. On the present evidentiary record, that should end the inquiry.

We understand that Imagine may contend that attempts were made to contact Mr. Northern by text message while he was performing, and that his failure to respond contributed to the decision to ban him.

Mr. Northern was not ignoring festival management. He was not super-poking people on Facebook or reading the news.

A performing artist cannot reasonably be expected to monitor personal text messages while simultaneously selecting and presenting music. As Mr. Richie observed, once you get started, you can't sit down - a principle that applies with equal force to checking one's phone. Nothing about the ordinary relationship between a festival and an artist establishes that the artist's personal phone will serve as an emergency production intercom during the set.

We would also observe, with respect, that there is a particular irony in retroactively sanctioning a performance of "All Night Long." The work's entire and repeatedly stated thesis is that the assembled company shall continue - that the celebration shall persist, in Mr. Richie's formulation, as a "fiesta, forever." To halt the song at precisely the hour it contemplates is not enforcement; it represents a fundamental failure to read the dome.

The Festival holds itself out as a gathering for dreamers of the future, devoted to transformation. Its own promotional language amounts to a standing invitation - not dissimilar to Lionel's invitation to "come join our party, see how we play." Mr. Northern accepted. He played. The Festival now objects to how.

A festival making that promise owes its participants a sanctioned route to remain awake, in motion, and in good company through dawn.

Mr. Richie articulated the governing principle in 1983, and the public has ratified it on dance floors ever since.

We will spare the Festival the celebrated untranslated refrain, which loses something on the page in any event.

1. Reinstatement. Mr. Northern shall be reinstated and booked as Phidelity for a main stage performance at Imagine 2026, consistent with the offer Mr. Leong extended on September 7, 2025, and subsequently withdrew without explanation. Festival materials may accurately describe the performance as ambient, electroacoustic, modular, experimental, beatless, transitional, or genre-resistant.
2. Compensation. Mr. Northern shall not be compensated at rates derived from or comparable to those paid in 2001. For the avoidance of doubt, "exposure," "community," and "but you were going to be there anyway" shall not be treated as forms of monetary compensation.
3. Confirmation. Phidelity shall be included on the official Imagine website and in the published artist lineup. His placement shall not be omitted, reduced, or delayed on the theory that a 4:00 a.m. performance exists outside ordinary time and is therefore administratively invisible.
4. Withdrawal of Finding. Imagine shall provide a written statement confirming that the available evidence does not support a conclusive finding that his performance was excessively loud. It shall further confirm, in language acceptable to the parties, that Mr. Northern was not tryn' to rage it, bro.
5. Sound Standard. Any future concern regarding Mr. Northern's sound level shall be evaluated from a representative audience position rather than immediately beside a stage monitor. In the absence of calibrated measurements, the ability to hear Elliot Rasenick's laugh and Meris's ordinary speaking voice above the music shall create a rebuttable presumption that the music is not excessively loud.

Please provide a written response within ten business days confirming whether Imagine will withdraw the ban and implement the corrective actions described above.

Mr. Northern remains interested in resolving this matter constructively and in continuing his long relationship with the Imagine community. The requested 2026 performance offers a practical remedy: it restores an improperly excluded artist while giving Imagine a carefully managed, low-intensity overnight program capable of carrying participants through the final hours without requiring anyone to rage it.

Nothing in this letter constitutes a waiver of Mr. Northern's rights, claims, remedies, artistic discretion, or entitlement to select music without simultaneously monitoring his personal telephone.