


It’s a truly wonderful music festival in France which brings cities and towns alive with the sound of music. Most places are given special permission to stay open longer than usual to celebrate the fête de la musique. Bars and restaurants will also have musicians play for the public, so if you take a stroll down a French street you will hear music coming from every direction.
#LA FETE DE LA MUSIQUE FREE#
Many of the concerts are held outside as it is light for longer in the summer evenings and is generally warm, however many concert halls and theaters also open their doors to welcome members of the public free of charge.
#LA FETE DE LA MUSIQUE PROFESSIONAL#
In major cities across the country, roads and streets are often blocked off to make way for concerts! The festival is free and performed by both amateur and professional musicians. If you’re ever in France on June 21, you’ll know straight away that it’s the fête de la musique. How is the fête de la musique celebrated? So they decided to create the fête de la musique to provide free music that all French people could enjoy and that included all musical genres. Lang and Fleuret came up with the concept of “music everywhere and concerts nowhere”: they wanted to make it possible for everyone in the country to be able to listen to all styles and genres of music wherever they were.įollowing a large survey held in 1982, the pair were surprised to discover that one in two young people in France played a musical instrument because they felt that any prior musical events only concerned a small minority of the population. The primary aim of the fête de la musique is simply to celebrate music and make it accessible to everyone. June 21, 1982, marks the very first time the fête de la musique was held in the country.

Lang had appointed Maurice Fleuret as the director of music and dance and they developed the concept of a music day in France. It was only several years later in 1982 that the idea was eventually implemented by Jack Lang, the Minister of Culture in France. He was working as a producer for the station and proposed the idea of “Saturnalia of Music”, a way to celebrate both the summer and winter solstice. Ironically the idea for the fête de la musique began in the 1970s with an American musician, Joel Cohen, who was working for Radio France, the French national radio station. This world music day is held every year in France on June 21, which coincides with the summer solstice. When is world music day, or Fête de la musique? It is also known as World Music Day or Make Music Day in English. You should also check with your local tourist office or your hotel for details of events near you.Simply put, the fête de la musique is a free music festival held in France every year. Programmes are not normally available until June at the earliest. Launched in 1982 by the French Ministry for Culture, the Fête is different from a music festival, in that all the concerts and performances are free to the public and none of the artists are paid. The Fête de la Musique is now celebrated all over the world, where it is more commonly referred to as World Music Day.įête de la Musique is one of those certain nights throughout the year when the French authorities waive normal licensing laws, allowing the revelry to continue as long as there are people with the stamina to enjoy it – it is definitely one of the not-to-be-missed events of the summer social calendar.įor more details of programmes please visit their website directly. More than a music festival, the La Plagne Fête de la Musique is a free event that spills out from the bars and restaurants onto the streets and encompasses every type of music imaginable, from local amateur teen bands to professional classical musicians, from club DJ’s to traditional folk bands.

The Fête de la Musique is a celebration that takes place every summer solstice on 21st June in cities, towns and villages across France.
