Discover Athens' Vibrant Open-Air Summer Festivals

This time every year the agenda of Athens is filled with outdoor events and festivals that take the people out and invite them to have fun under the sky of Attica. This year the Athenians will come together, for the seventh straight year, to enjoy free open-air screenings in parks and squares, within the framework of the “Athens Open Air Film Festival,” and the atmosphere will be somewhat “creepy”! This long (June-August) summer cinema festival is dedicated to British Gothic Cinema this year. The key figure, of course, will be Christopher Lee (“Dracula,” “The Wicker Man”); Roman Polanski will be there with the “Fearless Vampire Killers,” while the program is complemented by various films of the kind worth remembering. “Release Athens” is a music festival that will be held in a beautiful venue, close to the center of Athens and next to the sea. Artists such as Royksopp, Moderat (2/6), Thievery Corporation, Archive, Kadebostany (16/6) and Jamiroquai, Michael Kiwanuka, Wax Taylor (17/6) will throw an endless live party at the Plateia Nerou (Water Square). In the same place, a few days later the “Ejekt Festival” will feature The Killers and The Kills on 24/6, while on 14/7 Kasabian and Jesus and the Mary Chain will be flanked by a set of upcoming names of the international and domestic scene. The 5th “Athens Gardens Festival” comes to the National Garden and the Pedion Areos in the heart of the city, from June 8th to 11th, with the subject “natural musical landscapes & expressions of romance.” In this context, 13 concerts and an educational environmental-artistic program will take young and old spectators on a trip to the magical world of the natural landscapes of music.