'I put my city on the map.' J.Cole closes out second Dreamville Festival

Dreamville Festival ended on Sunday night with the final performer also being the festival's creator — J.Cole.

Cole, who was born in Germany but raised in Fayetteville, designed the music festival to be a "family reunion," according to the guide handed out to the thousands of attendees who descended to Dorothea Dix Park this weekend.

In his performance on Sunday night, Cole noted that he might have passed out a mixtape to some people in the crowd before he became a Grammy award-winning rapper.

Cole performed well-loved hits from past album 2014 Forest Hills Drive, which was named for Cole's childhood home in Fayetteville.

During the performance of 'Nobody's Perfect,' when he sang the lyric, 'Look mama we made it,' Cole could be seen clasping his head and taking in weight of the lyric in the moment.

Even with the rise to fame, Cole, who has won BET and Billboard Music Awards in addition to having all five of his albums being certified platinum, always seems to keep his North Carolina roots in mind.

Shortly after performing the first song of his set, Cole asked festival organizers to turn the lights on so he could the depth of the crowd. As the lights brightened, Cole asked how many people were from North Carolina, and specifically, how many were from Fayetteville.

But, Cole also appeared to be in awe of how far some concert goers had traveled to attend the festival. One attendee in the front of the Shine Stage caught Cole's attention — stating he had traveled over 3,000 miles for the festival and asked for Cole to sign an object,

Without hesitation, he asked production staff to bring up the attendee's item to sign.

For the second half of Cole's hour-long performance, several artists signed to Cole's label, which bears the same namesake as the festival, joined him on stage.

Dreamville Festival displayed the talents of the artists signed with the label throughout the entire weekend. Dreamville artists Earthgang and J.I.D. performed on Saturday while Ari Lennox performed on Sunday prior to J.Cole.

Cole also had fellow North Carolina-based artists on the festival's lineup. One of the first performers for this year's festival was Jacksonville native Mikhala Jené.

She described the festival as "a moment, not only for North Carolina, but for everyone."

Meanwhile, Lil Baby was the final performer on Saturday night.

As the world begins to return to large events, multiple performers told the Dreamville crowd how thankful they were to be able to back on a stage.

"It's a blessing to be back here," said Bas, who was Dreamville's first signee.

J.Cole influence could be seen throughout the festival grounds. On a wall dedicated to writing inspirational messages, several post it notes featured J.Cole lyrics including "Martin Luther King would have been on Dreamville" from J.Cole's song No Role Modelz and "love yourself girl or nobody will" from his song Crooked Smile.

As fireworks lit up the sky to signal the end of the festival's second year, J. Cole looked at the crowd and simply stated, 'We'll see y'all next year."