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A circle pit is a term for aggressive, violent dancing associated with moshing performed by people running in a circle usually at Rock music gigs. It is a type of strenuous dancing associated with certain subgenres of music such as ska, punk rock, thrash, heavy metal, and even some harder rock and electronic music, usually started by members of the crowd running wildly in a circle slamming into each other in response to the speed of the music and the beat. The tempo and speed of the music playing also play a big role on how fast and intense the circle pit is; if a blast beat is being played, the mosh pit will be much more intense than a pit danced to, say, a basic rock beat.

A circle pit is a large and usually roughly circular clearing in the audience of a music concert slightly apart from the front of the stage. The circle is formed from the members clearing the space and running in a counterclockwise direction. A circle pit varies from a mosh pit in that a mosh pit usually does not have any sort of orderly behavior: participants in a mosh pit often push, shove and bounce off each other rather than moving in a circle.

A meat grinder is a variation on a circle pit. Dancers form a circle, running counterclockwise. Inside of this is another circle, in which dancers run clockwise. Inside of this is yet another circle of dancers running counterclockwise. In the middle there is small mosh pit, being kept in by the innermost circle. This generally occurs at ska punk, ska-core, hardcore punk, and punk rock concerts.

Fans of different punk, metal or rock styles often have their own rules or characteristics for pits, ranging from relatively friendly to deliberately violent. Originally associated with subcultures, pits have been seen more and more in association with mainstream acts. Typically, circle pits at mainstream concerts are considered to be relatively safe.

Origins and Characteristics

Circle pits can be traced to the Bay Area thrash metal scene in the early 1980s, as reported by numerous thrash metal artists. The first video recording of a mosh pit can be found in the movie Another State of Mind viewable here.

The early characteristic motions of circle pit participants were flailing of the arms, pushing one another, striking others with elbows, or exaggerated arm and leg movements somewhat similar to the '60s dance called "The Monkey".

Essentially, circle pits involve simply skipping, skanking, running, or power walking rapidly around the rim of the moshpit. The saying "Run fast, turn left" describes circle pit behavior: an anticlockwise rotation is observed by dancers inside the circle pit, and moving clockwise would be difficult for all but the largest and most determined.

Audience members not involved in the mosh but on the innermost part of the circle often act as "bouncers", "eye of the pit", "pit-pushers" or "pit boss", pushing moshers back into the pit if they are shoved out of the circle. Often, the innermost circle will try to catch anyone from falling over and into the crowd, or help up those that do.

Sometimes a participant will stop abruptly to cause a sort of moshing traffic collision. This is usually performed by a large audience member who can withstand the power of the crowd behind them.

Quite often somebody will yell out "open the pit" and people will move back to create the open circle.

Risks and Dangers

At Download Festival 2007, DevilDriver fans attempted to create the world's largest circle pit around 6 pillars holding up the tent, covering the Dimebag Darrell stage, footage can be seen here. At Reading Festival 2007, Lostprophets lead singer Ian Watkins told the crowd to start many circle pits, during the song Shinobi vs. Dragon Ninja.

• Articles with topics of unclear notability from April 2008
• Syllabus-free dance
• Punk
• Heavy metal subculture