“Before we get any further, I’d like to introduce myself,” said the last performer to take the stage at the first-ever Sand in My Boots festival. “My name is Morgan Wallen.”

Rarely has an introduction been less necessary. The people in front of Wallen had snapped up 40,000 tickets the day they went on sale last October. At the time, they didn’t know a lot about the event. They knew it would keep the familiar setting and timing of the Hangout Music Fest. They knew it would feature a slate of artists heavy on country with some rock, rap and pop mixed in. Mainly they knew that Wallen, arguably the hottest thing in country music for the last half-decade, had a hand in shaping its lineup and other features.

They’d swarmed back and forth across the beach in Gulf Shores all weekend, catching Post Malone and Brooks & Dunn and Ella Langley and Riley Green, among others, on the main Sand in My Boots Stage, and a more eclectic roster including T-Pain, Three 6 Mafia, 2 Chainz, Future Islands, The War On Drugs and Wiz Khalifa on the Dangerous Stage. It’s a safe bet that many of them, when not on the festival site, had been listening to Wallen’s latest album, “I’m the Problem,” released on Friday.

So when Wallen bounded out onto the stage Sunday with the energy of a tennis player, no introduction was required. No explanation was, either, but when Wallen paused after the first couple of songs, he offered a few thoughts on the origins of Sand in My Boots and maybe a hint of its future.

“I appreciate you choosing to spend your Sunday night here with me,” he said. “Me and a couple of my closest friends and teammates, we’ve been throwing the idea of doing a festival around for a long time now, and we just happened to run into the right partner and the right people to work with. And with a lot of hard work and a lot of really great artists to come out here, man, we got to make that happen.

“And I’ve heard nothing but great reports about how this weekend has went,” he said. “I mean, you guys tell me, have you had a great time this weekend?” The crowd cheered.

“Okay, we’ll try to do it again sometime,” he said. “Thank you guys for making this possible.”

With that, Wallen launched into the title track from the new album, cueing up the last hour of music at Sand in My Boots.

The festival’s third day, like its first two, was a hot one. Crowds built a little more slowly than they had on Saturday, but by sunset the turnout was just as strong. The sporadic congestion that had affected some bottlenecks on Saturday didn’t seem quite as heavy, whether because people were getting more savvy about navigating the site or because they were staking out their turf and staying put as Wallen’s set approached.

“We’ll try to do it again sometime” leaves a few questions unanswered. Organizers have presented Sand in My Boots as a one-year takeover of the Hangout Fest – but its effortless sellout is a feat that Hangout hasn’t matched in a long time. Before either one can return, organizers and Gulf Shores city leaders will have to come to terms on a new franchise agreement, as the old one expired with this year’s event.

In the short term, the aftermath of Sand in My Boots will look much like the aftermath of a Hangout Fest: A rapid exodus of visitors, and a rapid teardown of the festival site in order to clear the way for the Memorial Day weekend. Plans called for all of Gulf Shores’ public beaches and beach access points to reopen to the public by 6 p.m. Thursday, May 22.