The biggest choir competition in the world, the World Choir Games, will begin on 9 July 2008 in the Austrian city of Graz. Once again, thousands of singers from all over the world will come together in peaceful competition to determine the champion of all choirs. Why don't you represent your country with your choir, along with the rest of the world's choirs! The Austrian public broadcaster, ORF, and other TV and radio stations will be covering the competition and will broadcast one of the big evening events.
For the first time, the festival is also open to brass bands, folklore ensembles and traditional dance troupes.
The 50th World Festival of Folklore Schoten will be held from 11 to 18 July, 2008.
In 1959 members of a folklore group and the local tourist association founded The World Festival of Folklore in Schoten in order to promote folk art by presenting it to the public in a beautiful setting, being the historical castle and its surroundings.
The festival takes place every year from Friday before through Friday after the second Sunday in July. Eight to 10 high quality foreign dance ensembles present their program to an audience totalling 30 to 35.000.
It is an amateur festival and therefore meant in the first place to non-professional folk art groups of a high artistic standard. For the sake of preservation the organisers prefer authentic folklore, but they accept adaptation to the stage.
Kasteel van Schoten
Kasteeldreef 61
2900 Schoten
Belgium