Jelly Roll and Ludacris rock Florida on Day One of 2025 Tortuga Festival

By Dave Parsons

The Tortuga Festival kicked off its highly anticipated 12^th anniversary 2025 edition with a bang, treating attendees to a day filled with unforgettable performances, vibrant energy, and the spirit only live music can bring.  Tortuga is a unique festival in that it works with the Rock the Ocean Foundation, educating a huge crowd and raising money, which is now over 4 million dollars. 

Fans from across the country came together on the shores of Fort Lauderdale Beach, anticipating a great weekend as one kicked off at 1 PM.  From the moment the gates opened, the crowd made their way to one of the stages on either end of the beachfront venue (or the one under the tent in the center of the excitement), or visited some of the pop-up shops or food vendors in the large festival village. 

The lines for all of these got longer as the day went so it took some strategy and pre-planning to make sure you saw everything you wanted to see. With 80-degree, picture-perfect weather, everything was set for a first day of musical magic.

Day one of Tortuga 2025 was headlined by Jelly Roll. One of the hottest acts in country music in recent years, his full-blown stage production delighted the crowd throughout his set.  Looking slimmer from his documented workout and weight loss in recent months, Jelly Roll showed great stage presence, constantly moving from one end of the giant stage to the other, and down the long catwalk several times, giving the folks down front, as well as those further back, a full diverse stage show.

Ludacris played the Verizon Sunset Stage, about 200 yards down the beach, immediately before Jelly Roll.  Ludacris was one of the alternative genre acts that Tortuga is famous for having every year.  He endeared the crowd, many of whom sang along to every word of every song, in a walk down memory lane for many in the crowd. He is a force to be reckoned with in music, and a testimony to his long career.

Parker McCollum, who has headlined his own country tours of late, brought his string of country hits to the main stage as the sun was starting to set, and the crowd was reaching its peak for the day.  He certainly has gained a legion of fans with his boyish good looks and strong country sound and lyrics.

The Tortuga festival is known primarily for its country acts, but they also add in acts from other genres that are known crowd pleasers.  Such as it was with Marcus King.   Still a relatively new household name, King is a cross between a traditional blues and Americana act. With orange-colored amps and guitar cords, King commands attention before taking the stage.  By the time he plugged in and hit the first chord, he had the beachfront audience’s attention for a musical blues ride in the Florida heat.

Veteran country hitmaker, Gary Allan, brought a mid-afternoon party to the Ft. Lauderdale beach.  Dressed in mostly black, Allan ripped into a list of hits that took the crowd for a nostalgic ride. His tight traditional country band played these songs just as you hear them on your playlist, making his live set fly by. Allan has always been kind of lost in the shuffle of huge names in country music.  A set like this makes you realize how many hits he did have and the contributions he has made to the industry.

Artikal Sound System is a reggae band from right up the road in Delray Beach, Florida. Another of the non-country-based bands on this day, the group took the crowd through a set that blended roots and modern sounds, with the great female lead vocals, and put the crowd in a good mood to go along for the ride.

Gavin DeGraw, whose hit single became the theme song for the drama series One Tree Hill, was welcomed for his afternoon set with great enthusiasm.  His pop-influenced, keyboard-driven set got the crowd in a great mood for the rest of the day.

This was just a taste of these two stages, facing each other, about 200 yards apart on the beach.  In the middle of the two stages, there is a large white tent that hosts the Next from Nashville Stage. The music never stopped in this tent either, as it offered some great music and some respite from the afternoon sun, especially if you were trekking down the beach between the main stages. 

On day one, the Next from Nashville Stage offered a wide variety of acts including Charlie Worsham, Bayker Blakenship, Jade Eagleson, Denitia and Jenna LaMaster.  Each had a brief set to impress and win over the crowd.  The tent was jammed for almost all of the acts that were performed, and rightly so.  It will only be a matter of a few years before these acts will be on the large beachfront stages at Tortuga. 

As attendees headed home, sun-kissed and smiling, they couldn’t help but look forward to what day two of the festival would bring. If day one was any indication, it was sure to be another day filled with unforgettable moments and memories that would last a lifetime.

Disclaimer:  It is next to impossible, because of overlapping set times on stages 200 yards apart, artist preference, and other factors, to photograph and review every act at the festival.  I photographed as much as was possible each day.