Festival Month in France - June

Musee du Landau, St. Aubin de Scellon (Eure) Fete de la Peinture
Photo by Chris Card Fuller ©2007

There are possibly two reasons why June has become a month jam-packed with festivals. The first is obvious - the days are longer - and hopefully more pleasant than the past few weeks of May. Fete de la Musique, held on the longest day- June 21st has become firmly entrenched throughout France as the day you’re likely to find all sorts of music events, and many of them, free to the public. In Paris, this means if you wander around during the evening, you’re likely to bump into improvised street music, particularly where there’s heavy pedestrian traffic.

Musee du Landau, St. Aubin de Scellon (Eure)
Photo by Chris Card Fuller ©2007

Today (Sunday June 3rd), Fete de la Peinture (The Painting Festival)is being celebrated its third year in the Normandy’s Eure departement, which means that local Norman artists will be opening up their studios to visitors. I stopped at the Atelier des Artistes to say ‘bonjour’ to Gerard Daric and Nicole Camilliere, resident artists. Gerard is a transplanted Parisian. He told me that the last time he drove into Paris, he was stuck for four hours in a traffic jam. “Paris!”

If you check out www.parisinfo.com, many of the June festivals are listed including the Gay Pride March on June 30, 2007, Fete de la Musique, the St. Germain-des-Pres fair, celebrating its 30th anniversary (this June 7-8).

One of the events that did not make the Parisinfo cut, is the World Naked Bike Ride on June 9th, reported in the June issue of French News (which may not yet be posted on the net) If you want more details on the World Naked Bike Ride meeting point (it’s really a protest, not a festival which is one of the reasons it wouldn’t be listed on the Parisinfo site), you can check out their site www.cyclonudiste.fr. I don’t know how many people will be showing up for the event, but it should make an interesting photo op for you intrepid photographers.

As for my theory about the second reason there are so many festivals in June. The month of May is so filled up with religious holidays that already the banks are public offices are closed for a good part of May. Not much was going on in June - in the ‘old days’ except in the country - where things happen to be GROWING. Which leaves the city dwellers with money that is desperate to change pockets. I hope the spririt of Fete de la Musique - remains a ‘free’ event, but already there are signs that commercial events are trying to ride on the coattails of a neighborhood celebration.

Enjoy the month of June in Paris, and in France. You don’t have to spend money to enjoy. Make music, paint, sing. Dance an Irish jig.