As the week progresses, we will guide you through each day's festivities. Tickets are still available to many of them and some events are free, so everyone has the opportunity to experience part of the magic. Tickets are available for purchase on bilesuparadize.lv's Song and Dance Festival section.
The events listed here are not exhaustive – we have picked out a selection of highlights.
In addition, you can watch performances live on LSM and find out more about the Song and Dance Festival's 150th anniversary at the official website.
Wednesday, July 5
Parade of Latvian Folk Costumes "In Moonlight"
Time: 19:00 – 20:30
Location: Hansa Platform (Hanzas persons, Hanzas Street 16A)
For Latvians, folk costumes are the people’s cultural code and a symbol of national identity. Each region and nearly each village of Latvia has a variation of the folk costume, with symbolism down to the tiniest detail. The Song and Dance Festival has featured the parade since 1998.
Tickets: EUR 15 – EUR 25
LIVE: LMT Straume, LSM.lv
Brass band concert "Time Flows Over" and open-air dance party
Time: 21:00 – 3:00
Location: Wondersala (Andrejostas Street 17)
Music in brass bands is an integral part of the Latvian Song Festival tradition alongside the choir singing. Brass bands have played an important place in Latvian history, playing open-air dancess, funerals and weddings, as well as fights for freedom. The concert is designed as a story of the masculinity and maturity of the Latvian people.
The concert will be followed by an open-air dance party (zaļumballe), also a Latvian cultural phenomenon to be experienced.
Tickets: EUR 10
LIVE: LTV1, LSM.lv, LR3
Dress rehearsal for the Grand Choir Concert "The field. The road of the song"
Time: 20:00 –23:30
Location: Mežaparks Great Stage
Since the tickets to the final concerts usually disappear quickly, it is tradition to invite visitors to the dress rehearsal.
The grand choir will perform folk song arrangements and original pieces inspired by folk songs, while a cappella singing will play the central role in the concert. The program includes both the legacy of previous Song Festivals and pieces which express in an artistically vivid manner the Latvian identity, the freedom of our people, respect for the legacy of our ancestors, the search for spiritual purity and an insight into the future, says the concert description.
Tickets: EUR 15 – 40
