The Complete Guide to Sonar Festival 2020
The foundations of Sónar festival, pioneering cultural event with a unique format and content, were laid in 1994 by the journalist Ricard Robles together with musicians and visual artists Sergio Caballero and Enric Palau. Its first class reputation as a leading reference for international festivals is thanks to its attention in curation, combining a playful nature, the avant-garde, and experimentation with newest trends in dance and electronic music. During its 25-year history, Sónar has transformed the dynamics and atmosphere of the city every June, as well as making Barcelona into the continent’s epicenter of electronic music and one of its main attractions in the cultural tourism sector from its very earliest years.
Venues
Artists
Visitors
Barcelona
Festival ticket 150 €
Hotel 50 – 100 €
Daily spent 25 – 50 €
What to Expect at Sonar Festival Barcelona
In its inaugural edition in 1994, Sónar organized a fair for professionals with a dual dimension: a record and publishing fair (record labels, distributors, publications, publishers, promoters) and a technology fair (hardware and software brands, musical equipment companies). This format would undergo several incarnations over the years, gradually evolving away from the trade fair format and expanding to include art installations, film screenings, talks and conferences. Coniciding with the move of Sónar by Day to Fira Montjuic in 2013, this section of the festival program was re-imagined as Sónar+D. Oriented as a 3-day congress of Creativity, Technology and Business running concurrently to Sónar by Day, the congress includes movie screenings at SonarCinema, installations at Sonarama, tech activities at SonarPro, exhibitions at SonarMatica and displays of new technologies with creative applications. Recent editions have featured artists and thinkers such as Brian Eno, Jean-Michel Jarre and Richie Hawtin, as well as representatives of studios and companies of international note Including as United Visual Artists, Kickstarter and Spotify.
“Sónar has become a platform for creativity across various disciplines, always with an eye closely trained on what’s happening in the margins of music, technology and digital culture.”
Sónar + D
Coniciding with the move of Sónar by Day to Fira Montjuic in 2013, this section of the festival program was re-imagined as Sónar+D. Oriented as a 3-day congress of Creativity, Technology and Business running concurrently to Sónar by Day, the congress includes movie screenings at SonarCinema, installations at Sonarama, tech activities at SonarPro, exhibitions at SonarMatica and displays of new technologies with creative applications. Recent editions have featured artists and thinkers such as Brian Eno, Jean-Michel Jarre and Richie Hawtin, as well as representatives of studios and companies of international note Including as United Visual Artists, Kickstarter and Spotify.
Sónar by Day
Sónar by day runs from Thursday through Saturday at Fira Montjuïc. Across 3 days you can listen to the full range of electronic artists in the glorious sunshine, whilst seated in an auditorium or highly-produced club spaces. Highlights in 2017 include Arca and Jesse Kanda, RP Boo, Lena Willikens, Thundercat, Denis Sulta, Optimo, Craig Richards, Clark and Prins Thomas.
Sónar by Night
Sónar’s night programme is a host of concerts and performances that take place at Fira Gran Via – a huge exhibition venue in the centre of town. This year you can expect headline performances from Legendary hip hop group De La Soul as well as Nicolas Jaar and French duo Justice, presenting their newly released album “Woman” in a strikingly visual, onstage spectacular. On Saturday night, we return to the SonarLab stage too.
Sonar Festival Worldwide
Sónar made its first international foray to London in 2002. Since then, the festival has held events in notable cities such as – With the increased interest of Sonar Festival, the organizers decided to expand its borders Worldwide to new locations such as, London, Hamburg, Frankfurt, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Rome, Tokyo, Osaka, Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, Montreal, Buenos Aires and many other.
We are Europe
For 2 years now Sonar has been part of the We are Europe project, which is co-founded by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union. The project is being led by Nuits Sonores Festival (Arty Farty organisation) Festival), and 8 established European festivals in total, including Reworks Festival (read our interview with its founder Ison, here) c/o pop Festival, Insomnia, Elevate, TodaysArt and Resonate Music. All festivals support each other in creating and curating part of each other’s programs and line-ups, all promoting culture, visuals and creative arts.
Sonar Festival Lineup 2018 Announced
Visit Sonar Festival
Tickets Sonar 2018
Buy Sonar tickets, Sonar Pass for all days and nights, Sonar 2 nights ticket, Sonar by Night or Sonar by Day tickets from their official website.
Book Hotels
Sonar Festival does not offer specifically designed for the event accommodation, but is providing useful links and information regarding, where to stay on their website. Nevertheless, there is a huge choice of accommodation options to choose from in Barcelona. Some useful websites to search from are: Tripadvisor Airbnb.
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Sonar Festival 2018 Highlights
28/06/2018 -
Sonar Festival lineup 2018 completed
27/02/2018
Image copyrights Ariel Martini, Nerea Coll and Sonar Festival
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12/02/202023:00