Sonar Festival: Sounds of Summer

Get ready kids for the big one. Sonar Festival is Barcelona's biggest and best contemporary music event, and one of the city's bona fide highlights of the cultural calendar. Dubbing itself 'the international advanced music and multimedia art festival' (translation: rave up), Sonar brings the very best of electronic music to Barcelona, for three days every year in June.

The inaugural event took place in 1994, and since then the festival has blown up in terms of popularity and international acclaim. Amongst the legendary artists that have taken to the stage/decks/laptops are Orbital, Chemical Brothers, Kraftwerk, Kruder & Dorfmeister, Bjork, Pet Shop Boys and (in an unannouced appearance in 2006) the Scissor Sisters. Despite the appearance of these giants, Sonar is as much about new and relevant music, and the mainstay of each year's programme is given over to quality acts, that may not be household names, but most musos would give their right arm to hear play - think Four Tet, Justice, Hercules & Love Affair and Richie Hawtin. Then of course there's plenty of scope given to local bands and artists whose talent merits a much wider audience - Cabo San Roque and The Pinker Tones spring to mind!

Above: Things get blurry at the Sonar Village by day

Sonar by Day

The action is split temporally and geographically into Sonar by Day and Sonar by Night. Sonar by Day begins at midday and takes place in the heart of the Raval district (part of the Ciutat Vela, or Old Town) where a specially-created complex is made from the MACBA museum and CCCB. The vibe is very much Space Ibiza as a good-looking crowd sip expensive mojitos and cheer on the DJs playing at the Sonar Village (the openair main stage by the CCCB).

Sonar by Night

By night things get considerably more raucous. A chemically enhanced crowd make their way to the Fira Gran Via, a vast state-of-the-art exhibition centre in the suburb of L’Hospitalet de Llobregat. Here the venue is split into three major zones, Sonar Park, Sonar Pub and Sonar Club covering a whopping 100,000 metres squared. Safe to say that if you like electronic music, and you like raving, you're gonna have a good time.

Meanwhile special concerts, with separate ticketing also take place during the festival at the L'Auditori.

Getting to Sonar

Getting to Sonar by Day presents no problems. The MACBA/CCCB where it is held are just ten minutes from the top of La Rambla (metros Plaza Catalunya or Universitad are nearest) and bounding beats and a chain of fashion-conscious beatfreaks should signpost the way. Getting to Sonar by Night requires a little bit of effort but thanks to the organisers throwing on a regular bus service from the city centre not much. Sonar Bus leaves from Placa de les Drassanes near the bottom of Las Ramblas (metro: Drassanes) and shuttles uninterruptedly Friday and Saturday from 8:30pm to 8am. For more transport options and info head to the relevant page on the official site.

Buying Tickets for Sonar

There are three Sonar By Day events and two Sonar by nights, and a ticket to all costs, as of 2010, 155 euros. (Nb. each year you can save a few pennies by buying in advance... usually before mid-February). You can also buy separate tickets to each day and night event, at 39 and 60 euros respectively, or a two-night ticket for 100 euros. Again see advice on the official site for a list of vendors.

Sonar Accommodation

Accommodation is not hard to come by in Barcelona, although you won't be getting any discounts during Sonar weekend. Check out our Sleep section for a wide variety of Barcelona accommodation and hotels, or head straight to our apartments or hostels page if you're decided on what type of digs suit you best already.

Sonar 2011

There's never a quiet year at Sonar and 2011 is no exception with plenty of familiar names and faces to get musos salivating and counting down the days 'til June. Here are a just few of the acts we're excited about: James Murphy, Cut Copy, Trentemoller, Aphex Twin, The Human League, Magnetic Man and Shackleton... the rest you can read up about you know where: 2011.sonar.es.

Sonar 2010

So what's the story in 2010? Well the dates for the diary are June 17th, 18th and 19th and confirmed headliners so far include Chemical Brothers, Air, LCD Soundsystem and UK rap superstar Dizzee Rascal. Should be bonkers! What's more, for the first time in Sonar history there will be a concurrent event running in 2010 named Sonar Galicia, taking place in A Coruna (still waiting for more on that one!). No doubt there will be plenty more announcements to be made on the line-up as June gets nearer, so keep an eye on our news, Facebook and Twitter pages for the latest info.

Naturally Sonar's official webpage - www.sonar.es - is a handy resource for all your festival-related questions too! (Hint: you can switch to English at bottom right hand of page).

And finally...

Off Sonar/Anti-Sonar

Tickets to Sonar Festival are considered quite pricey for many of the city's residents so perhaps it's no surprise that virtually all the bars and clubs in Barcelona will attempt to cash in on the Sonar vibe by throwing parties of their own - some in the spirit of Sonar with cutting edge house and electro DJs... others not. Invariably there will also be a number of cheap raves, beach parties, fringe events and other shindigs, so keep your eyes out for posters and flyers around town. Right through the week leading up to Sonar things will be kicking off! The biggest unofficial event is called Anti-Sonar, although we've heard mixed things about it... go with locals if you wanna check it out. Users may post parties in the comments below.