Festa de São João do Porto is one of Europe's liveliest street festivals. Every year, on the night of 23 June, the city of Porto, in the north of Portugal, becomes lively and seemingly crazy. Thousands of people come to the city centre and to the most traditional neighbourhoods to pay a tribute to Saint John the Baptist, in a party that mixes sacred and profane traditions. The festivities have been held in the city for more than six centuries. The traditional attractions of the night include street concerts, popular dancing parties, jumping over flames, eating barbecued sardines and meat, drinking wine and releasing illuminated flame-propelled balloons over Porto's summer sky. The show is increasingly sophisticated with the fireworks being associated with themes and multimedia shows.

Tourism Office: Rua Clube dos Fenianos, 25 - 4000-172 Porto

Fireworks at the Festa de São João do Porto

The first Cascais Jazz Festival took place on November 20, 1971, in the Dramático de Cascais pavilion in Portugal. Today it is a high mix of sounds and trends. Cascais Cool Jazz Festival offers a unique experience for your summer nights: concerts of great players in the open in Cascais, the unique atmosphere of places where nature and architecture complement each other. The festival returns in July 2012 with an interesting proposal for the Portuguese music calendar: great international talents, on a journey through jazz languages and atmospheres. The program includes unforgettable concerts. The 9th edition recaptures the format that characterizes it: outdoor concerts where the most outstanding voices and melodies of today's music scene present themselves in a unique experience.

E-mail: geral@edpcooljazz.com

Optimus Alive! is a music and arts festival which takes place in the Algés riverside, in Oeiras, Portugal. The first edition took place in 2007. Despite its recent creation, the festival has achieved considerable popularity both inside and outside of Portugal, with the UK magazine NME placing in one of the top 12 European festivals in 2009. There are 3 types of tickets available: daily ticket – 53€, 3 day ticket – 105€ and a 3 day ticket + Camping – 121€. Acts from the the 2012 edition will include Justice, The Stone Roses, Snow Patrol, The Cure, Morcheeba and Radiohead.

Mail / Postal address: Escadinhas da Praia, nº3 1º direito 1200-769 Lisboa
E-mail: geral@optimusalive.com

Optimus Alive!

The Black & White Festival intends to celebrate the black and white aesthetics as a specific, peculiar and unique kind of artistic expression It celebrates the black & white aesthetics in film, photography and sound. It's located at Universidade Católica Portuguesa - Centro Regional da Foz – through the Escola das Artes in Oporto, Portugal. The 9th Black & White Audiovisual Festival, which receives video, audio and photographs in black and white, will take into competition works from all over the world. Over four days, several activities related to the audiovisual world will be carried out in addition to the competitions: artist talks, screenings and extensions from other international festivals. The nights will also be exciting with a broad cultural program. The festival shows more than videos and photos in two colours, it also encourages the creation of sound environments referring to the black and white.

Mail / Postal address: Universidade Católica Portuguesa - Escola das Artes, Festival Audiovisual Black&White, Rua Diogo Botelho, 1327, 4169-005 Porto, Portugal
E-mail: b&w@porto.ucp.pt

The Boom Festival The festival features music, paint, sculpture, video art, installations cinema and theatre. It is located in Idanha-a-Nova, Portugal. It is situated in a beautiful place in Portugal’s inland, near the Spanish border. The 2008 edition witnessed an influx of 35,000 visitors from 85 countries. Initially it started as a psytrance festival but has now incorporates a stage for world music, acoustic sets and live bands. As well as expanding musically the festival gives space to art galleries, natural sculptures, street theatre and fire dancing. The Liminal Village which is part of the festival houses lectures, yoga, films, meditation and discussions. Boom Festival does not rely on any commercial sponsor and focuses on the cultural aspects of art and music.

Mail / Postal address: Good Mood Lda/Boom Festival, Edifício Incubadora de Empresas, Zona Industrial, 6060-182 Idanha-a-Nova, Portugal
E-mail Ticket Master: info@boomfestival.org

Boom Festival

Avante! Festival is held named after the official newspaper of the Portuguese Communist Party. The festival is usually visited and participated in by hundreds of thousands of people, making the outside of the ground seem a gigantic camping park. The party itself consists of a three day festival of music, with the participation of hundreds of Portuguese and international bands and artists in five different stages, ethnography, gastronomy, debates, a book & music fair, theatre, cinema and sporting events.

Mail / Postal address: Quinta da Atalaia, Av Baía do Seixal, 2845-415 Amora-Seixal
E-mail: geral@festadoavante.pcp.pt

Situated in the west corner of Europe, the World Heritage City of Porto hosts a one of a kind film festival. Founded 30 years ago by a group of film fans and critics, Fantasporto, as it is known, started as a haven for sci-fi and fantasy films. Since the very beginning, Fantasporto had as goal the creation of a dynamic forum of all arts, with a strong tendency to show the best of fantasy films and the diversity of the film world. After a huge success in the first two years, the festival has broaden its horizons with thrillers and seven years later with a New Directors competition. In its 27th edition in February the festival reached 104,000 people and 5,000 media references. The films arrive from both from major companies such as Warner, Columbia, UIP or Fox, producers as Miramax, New Line or Summit and from top companies all over the world. The Grande Prémio Fantasporto is the highest prize awarded at the Fantasporto Film Festival and is presented to the director of the best feature film of the official competition.

Mail / Postal address: Fantasporto/Cinema Novo, Rua Aníbal Cunha, 84 - sala 1.6, 4050-046 Porto, Portugal
E-mail: info@fantasporto.com