What tours or suggestions do you have for a tour centered around musical performances?
Music abounds in Europe. But Salzburg and Vienna come to mind as where music's a big part of residents' lives. I'd try to catch one of the big music conventions that happen periodically.
Thanks, having visited Europe a couple of times, the challenge for me was to find when and where festivals were happening, given the language barrier reading information in different countries. Can you point me to a website or two that is appropriate and english friendly?
Which kind or kinds of music were you looking for?
If you are referred to a website that doesn't have an English option on it, you can use Google Translate. It's built in to the Chrome browser; if you're on another browser, it's at https://translate.google.com/. It's supposed to select the languages, but I find it does better if I choose (for instance, German to English). The translation is rough (don't try to use it for accurate conversation with a native speaker!), but it gets the job done for dates, places, etc.
If you're looking for an opera-focused tour, and have sufficient funds to go high-end, I know someone who is very pleased with Aria Tours: https://www.ariatours.com/opera-tours/. Note that they go everywhere, not just Europe.
Our frequent poster James E. has posted about where to find information about music performances in Budapest; if he doesn't answer in this thread, you can do a search or send him a private message.
Prague Spring Music Festival will happen for 72nd time this May. Check the program and other information here:
http://www.festival.cz/en?_ga=1.120046540.574457645.1451279641
Website is almost all in English. Under program and tickets you can see either "buy tickets" or "vstupenky vyprodany" which means "tickets sold out."
Most of festivals happen in the summer.
You do not necessarily need a guided tour you can organize it yourself and just for from city to city wherever festivals are happening but You should specify what kind of music you like so that way we can point you in the right direction. Also since the British are great music consumers and Europeans are great consumers of American music most of the festival sites are multi-lingual
Doesn't Salzburg have a Mozart music festival. Plus, there is a Sound of Music bus tour in that part of Austria that sounds like fun - corny but for SOM fans, fun. It all depends on what kind of music.
Judy B
Traditional music pub crawl in Dublin.
By chance, I decided to visit Coburg to visit the castle, and it turned out that International Samba Festival was going on. The performance groups come from all over the world, and the Altstadt resounds with the sounds of drumming. It was awesome! If you're anywhere in Bavaria during this time, definately go see it.
If you visit in May, don't miss the Eurovision Song Contest. Go to a bar, grab a glass of red wine, and enjoy the shlock and awe of Europe's annual song contest/display of bad taste.