Why Festivals?

The Edinburgh Festivals 🏆

Course 5 · Chapter 1 · Why Festivals? Scope & Sources

Every August the population of Edinburgh seems to double. Stages appear in car parks, in pubs and in church halls, the Royal Mile fills with flyers, and the sound of a bagpipe competes with a comedian's microphone. How did one small northern capital become a festival city, and which of the stories told about it are documented? This first chapter sets out the scope of the course, the main festivals and their calendar, and the sources to use. Names, dates and figures are from general knowledge and flagged "check".

Why Edinburgh?

A setting

A castle on a volcanic rock, a medieval Old Town and a Georgian New Town, all in one compact centre that is easy to walk (check the UNESCO listing of the Old and New Towns). Venues sit close together, which suits a festival.

A moment

The first festival followed the Second World War, when European countries wanted to rebuild cultural life, and Edinburgh offered a city undamaged by bombing (check this claim, Chapter 2).

A habit

Once one festival succeeded, others settled in the same weeks and months, and the city organised itself around them. A festival city is partly made by habit and by civic decisions (check).

The Main Festivals

Festival (check each)	Roughly when	What it is
Edinburgh International Festival	August; first held 1947	A curated programme of opera, theatre, music and dance by invited artists.
Edinburgh Festival Fringe	August; grew from 1947	An open-access festival, where anyone who finds a venue can perform; the largest arts festival in the world by number of shows (check).
Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo	August; first held 1950	A massed show of military bands, pipers and performers on the Castle Esplanade (check the first year).
Edinburgh International Book Festival	August; first held 1983	Author talks and events, held in tents in Charlotte Square for many years (check).
Edinburgh Art Festival and others	August	Visual art, film, jazz and blues, and more, running alongside.
Hogmanay	Late December to 1 January	Street parties and concerts to mark the Scottish New Year (Chapter 6).
Science, children's and other festivals	Spring and autumn	Smaller festivals that spread the calendar beyond August (check).

What the Course Covers

Chapters 2 and 3. The 1947 origin, the arrival of the Fringe and its growth.
Chapters 4 to 6. The Tattoo, the book, film and science festivals, and the winter festivals.
Chapters 7 to 9. The city and the crowd, the money and the politics, and the pandemic and its aftermath.
Chapter 10. A capstone with a method for judging claims about any festival.

Myths to Test

Common claim	The question a careful reader asks (check each)
The Fringe is the biggest arts festival in the world.	By what measure: shows, performances, tickets, audience, income?
The festivals were started to bring culture to a war-weary Britain.	Whose aim was it, and what do the founders' own words say?
The Fringe is where careers are made.	For which performers, how often, and who tells the story?
The festivals bring a huge amount of money to the city.	Which study, which year, and how was the figure calculated?
Residents love the festivals.	Which residents, what surveys, and what do the complaints say?
It has always been like this.	What was it like in 1947, 1980 and 2000?

Sources to Use

The festivals' own histories and archives, which are useful but written by the organisations themselves, so read them as one side of the story.
Newspaper coverage, including local and national papers, and reviews written at the time.
City council and economic reports, which give figures on visitors and spending, with different methods in different years (check).
Memoirs and interviews by performers, organisers and residents, which are vivid but sometimes shaped by memory.

A festival is a story told by many people Organisers, performers, critics, councillors, hoteliers and residents each tell a different version of the same weeks. A careful account asks who is speaking, what they gain from the story, and what could be checked against a record. That habit is used all through the course.

A British comparison Compare Edinburgh with other British festival towns and cities, such as Glastonbury for music, Hay-on-Wye for books, or Notting Hill for carnival (check the examples). Each grew from a particular place and moment, and each has had arguments over crowds and money.

Check the details Every name, date and figure in this course comes from general knowledge and is marked "check" where it is uncertain. Festival figures change from year to year and are counted in different ways, so verify against the festivals' current reports and independent studies before quoting anything.

Exercises

Exercise 1

Write down what you already believe about the Edinburgh festivals in five short statements, and mark each as documented, claimed or unknown.

→ Solution

Exercise 2

Choose one of the myths in the table and write a short plan for testing it: what evidence you would look for and where.

→ Solution

Exercise 3

Pick one festival from the table and list three questions you would ask before trusting a claim about its size or importance.

→ Solution

Quick Reference

Origins: the International Festival and the Fringe in 1947; the Tattoo in 1950 (check)
August: the International Festival, Fringe, Tattoo, Book Festival and others
Winter: Hogmanay and the winter festivals (check)
The method: ask who is speaking, what they gain, and what can be checked
The caution: size and money figures depend on how they were counted