Classical Music and Opera Festivals,
Your guide

Even if they host events in a number of venues, most classical music festivals in the world are based in a single town or city. Not so Riga–Jurmala. As the name implies, this festival – inaugurated only last summer – takes place both in the Latvian capital city of Riga and in the country’s flagship seaside resort of Jurmala. These two stunning locations share some twenty concerts based around four weekends in July and August.

“Just as Salzburg has Mozart, Budapest is extremely proud to have Liszt,” Csaba Káel, CEO of Müpa and chair of the executive board organising the festival, enthuses. With this year’s performance of Liszt’s long “lost” opera Sardanapalo, the festival once more lives up to its mission to, year by year, spread the oeuvre of the Hungarian music genius. Scholars are puzzled why Liszt decided to abandon his drafts.