Arts and Music Festivals
2010 Calendar

Other Festivals: English Speaking | UK Music

European Festivals | Exotic World Festivals

29 Dec - 2 January

SCOTLAND Edinburgh's Hogmanay - one of world's best New year Celebrations, a truly wild and wooly underwear occasion, with a torchlight procession, a Fire Festival, fireworks, concerts and much insobriety, in a city dark yet strangely light... Edinburgh Guide | Pictures

31 December - 16 Feb

AUSTRIA Vienna Balls - dazzling dances in a blizzard of snow and elegance, especially Vienna's New Year's Day Concert. Vienna Pictures

9 - 30 January

AUSTRALIA Sydney Festival - the biggest cultural event in the country, Sydney covers the arts from drama to music in international style but sadly lacking a mad Fringe. Sydney Pictures

19 Feb - 14 March

AUSTRALIA Adelaide Fringe - the country's primo arts festival mixes it with the unruly fringe. A huge, colourful event, Edinburgh in the sun, 1 month every 2 years [even numbers]. Adelaide Pictures

HUNGARY Budapest Spring Festival - all sorts of arts, music, drama, dance, exhibitions, poetry and kid's stuff, local and international, in the pleasant city of Budapest

14 May - 20 June

AUSTRIA Vienna Festival - this 5 week event offers a wide range of arts, especially music, naturally, but also dance and theatre, sometimes challenging pieces, all set in magnificent buildings. Vienna Pictures

RUSSIA, St Petersburg, the White Nights Festival in gorgeous, romantic and endlessly light St Pete. The 'Stars of the White Nights' [21 May - 19 July 2010] with a series of opera and ballet performances is the most important part of the Festival. St Petersburg Pictures

7 May - 2 June 2010 TBC

CZECH REPUBLIC Prague Spring International Music Festival - one of Europe's best music events in medieval Prague

24 May - 10 June 2010

ISRAEL Israel Festival [of music and performing arts], in Jerusalem. Dance, opera, drama and music from some of the world's most talented artists. Israel Guide

June - July TBC

GREECE Athens Festival - drama, dance and music in the 2,000 year old outdoor Odeion theatre at the base of Acropolis Hill. Location, location. Athens Pictures

5 -25 June TBC

FRANCE, Festival de Musique de Strasbourg, an international contemporary music festival.

4 - 30 June TBC

TURKEY International Istanbul Music Festival. An excellent month in the marvelous city of Istanbul, with everything from major concerts to traditional music. Turkey Guide

4 - 12 June

MOROCCO Fes Festival of World Sacred Music, in Fes [Fez] - not at all dull! Wide ranging music from Spanish gypsy laments to Sufi chanting in a perfectly evocative location in Morocco

mid June - mid July
one month long

INDONESIA Bali Arts Festival, Denpasar [near Kuta Beach]. A very exciting month of traditional song and dance embraced by the whole island, with processions and performances of all kinds all over Bali.

21 June
[same date every year]

FRANCE Fete de la Musique, in Paris. Free! A monster musical celebration all over this lovely city. Professionals mix with amateurs playing different sounds in different locations.

23 - 27 June

ENGLAND Glastonbury Festival, Somerset, England - a massive, multiple music event, with different stages featuring different music, but heavy on soft/hard rock variations. The closest to Woodstock most of us will ever get. Camping is fine...but why does it always rain? Tickets are VERY difficult to acquire.

2 - 31 July

FINLAND Savonlinna Opera Festival - a grand classical celebration in the Finnish lake district, set in magnificent 15thC St Olaf's Castle, Finland

2 - 17 July

SWITZERLAND Montreux Jazz Festival - all sorts of non-classical music featured, in spite of the name, in an appealing location on the shore of Lake Geneva in Montreux.

7 - 29 July
2010 TBC

FRANCE, Avignon, Festival d'Avignon, a dynamic and diverse Arts festival, boasting over 50 official productions and many more fringes in the stunning historic city of Avignon.

1 July - 21 July TBC

FRANCE, Aix-en-Provence, International Festival of Lyric Art [Festival d’Aix-en-Provence], a popular summer arts festival, especially for classical music.

11 - 15 July TBC

MOROCCO Marrakesh [Marrakech] Popular Arts Festival [Folklore Festival]- Morocco's most interesting city hosts the country's best arts festival, with Marrakesh's hyperactive Djamaa el Fna [square] going into orbit at this time.

14 July - 18 August TBC

AUSTRIA ImPulsTanz - a dynamic and diverse dance festival across the whole of lovely Vienna.

mid July - mid August
TBC

TUNISIA International Carthage Festival in Tunis, the country's biggest arts event, mixing local and international sounds in the old Roman amphitheatre. Tunisia Guide | Tunisia Pictures

Generally the last two Mondays in July TBC

MEXICO La Guelaguetza at Oaxaca - a lively and historic folk dance, music, and costume festival featuring Oaxaca state, Mexico.

GERMANY, Love Parade - no longer in Berlin, but in the city of Duisberg for 2010 and Gelsenkirchen for 2011. The wackiest of local festivals, a weekend of ecstatic body-baring by 1.5 million techno- ravers. Google translation from German: The Love parade lives. Diagonally, schrill and color-gladly...Sounds about right to us.

19 June for the Parade
28 -20 June

GERMANY Christopher Street Day [Berlin CSD Parade] and Lesbian and Gay Festival [Berlin Pride Festival] in Berlin - a monster Gay parade and street party.

25 July - 28 August

GERMANY Wagner Festival [Bayeruther Festspiele] at Bayreuth - very expensive and elitist, held in the unusual theatre that Wagner built.

25 July - 30 August TBC

AUSTRIA Salzburg Festival - opera and concerts. 'Europe's most prestigious summer musical event.' Very large, very expensive. Every year in Mozart's pretty home town of Salzburg. Austria Guide

10 - 12 August every year[International]

IRELAND Puck Fair in Killorglin, County Kerry. A large and loony street fair with plenty of singing, dancing and horse shows, and all overseen by King Puck - a goat. Ireland Guide

CANADA, Montreal Pride - a huge performing arts festival, gay, but not exclusively so. Free concerts, shows, parties conferences and more.

13 August -5 September [International]
6 - 30 August [Fringe]

SCOTLAND Edinburgh International Festival, and Edinburgh Festival Fringe - over a thousand shows of all kinds, ranging from opera to stand-up comedy, from near porn to mere corn. A monster art attack in great Edinburgh city. Not to be missed. Edinburgh Festival Pictures.

FINLAND, Helsinki Festival - a festival including concerts, performance arts, parties and children's events in Helsinki

16 - 22 August

IRELAND Fleadh Cheoil - a huge celebration of Ireland's music, dance and arts, with over 10,000 musicians roaming and playing all over the place. Hosted by a different town every year; 2010 in Cavan.

28 - 31 August TBC

ISRAEL Red Sea Jazz Festival in Eilat, south Israel. Excellent open air music in a dramatic environment. Israel Pictures

USA Monterey Jazz Festival in California. This, the oldest and longest running jazz festival in the world, always hosts some big names but also has workshops, exhibitions and other appropriate entertainment.

NEW ZEALAND, World of Wearable Art Awards Show in Wellington [2010] - a unique, bizarre and fascinating occasion for both artists and fashionists. New Zealand Guide | NZ Pictures

9 - 18 October 2009
2010 TBA

HUNGARY Budapest Autumn Festival - music, drama, dance, exhibitions, poetry and kid's stuff in interesting Budapest. Budapest Photos

15 Oct - 1 Nov 2009
2010 TBA

IRELAND, Wexford Wexford Opera Festival - a small but perfectly formed and positively regarded event in a brand new Opera House on a new date. Ireland Guide

AUSTRIA Kaiserball at Hofburg Congress Center in Vienna- a stunning, glamorous, lively winter Ball at the magnificent Hofburg Palace, every year. Vienna Photos