The Athens festival is the Athens Epidaurus Festival, which stages theatre, music and dance in the Roman Odeon under the Acropolis and in the ancient theatre of Epidaurus. Four main stages carry it, and the coach day trip to Epidaurus takes ten or eleven hours.
A visit to the Acropolis by day and a seat at the Odeon by night fit on one hill. Visitors who have not picked a destination yet can browse every route on the Greece Tours homepage.
What is the Athens festival?
It is the Athens Epidaurus Festival, a yearly arts event in the capital and at the ancient theatre of Epidaurus. Wikipedia says the Athens festival runs from late spring to autumn, with theatre, music and dance on its stages.
Wikipedia dates the start to nineteen fifty-five. The Athens festival and the Epidaurus Festival were founded together that year. Georgios Rallis, then Minister of the Presidency and a future Prime Minister, pushed for both. In the early years, the Hellenic Tourism Organisation managed the two events.
The programme mixes musical, theatrical and other cultural events. Ancient drama sits at its heart. Wikipedia lists tragedies by Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, plus the surviving comedies of Aristophanes. Other nights bring modern plays built on ancient myths. For about twenty years, the National Theatre of Greece staged the shows at Epidaurus.
Today the festival’s own organising company runs the joint Athens festival, according to Wikipedia. The official website calls it the leading cultural organisation in Greece. It also claims a place among the longest-running festivals in Europe without a break.
The heart of the season falls in summer. At Epidaurus, the shows fall on Friday and Saturday nights right through July and August. The page of the European Festivals Association adds that events now run in winter too. That change widens the summer programme into the colder months.
The festival is not the only way to see a play in the city. For bookable shows on other nights, read our guide to the Athens theater show options. Then keep one evening free for the Athens festival itself. Wikipedia notes that leading foreign companies and directors have joined Greek casts on its stages over the decades.
Which venues host the Athens festival?
Four main stages carry the Athens festival, says its official website. They are the Odeon of Herodes Atticus, the two theatres at Ancient Epidaurus and Peiraios 260. Other sites in Attica host one-off shows too.
The Odeon of Herodes Atticus sits below the Acropolis, on the southwest side of the hill. Herodes Atticus built it in AD 161 in memory of his Roman wife. Its seating and stage were restored with Pentelic marble in the nineteen-fifties. Since that restoration, the Odeon has served as the chief stage of the Athens festival.
Wikipedia gives the Odeon a capacity of 5,000, on stone benches. It was a steep-sloped theatre from the start, so the upper rows look down on the stage. Its list of past nights includes opera singers, orchestras and big concerts.
The Ancient Theatre of Epidaurus lies in the Argolis region, in the Peloponnese. Wikipedia says its sound and design are judged without equal among ancient Greek theatres. It joined the UNESCO World Heritage List in nineteen eighty-eight, together with the Temple of Asclepius.
The festival article puts its capacity at 10,000. The theatre article gives a maximum of 13,000 to 14,000 spectators in ancient times. If you plan to see the site by day as well, read our page on Epidaurus tickets.
Close by, the Little Theatre of Ancient Epidaurus joined the Athens festival later. Wikipedia says it began in nineteen ninety-five as a trial music series called Musical July. Its success made it a permanent part of the programme. Theatre followed the music in later years.
Until the mid-two-thousands, the festival used only the Odeon and Epidaurus. In the summer of two thousand and six, five new stages opened at Peiraios 260, a former industrial site. The official website says it has grown into a springboard for contemporary art.
Wikipedia also lists other city stages used over the years. They include Technopolis in Gazi and the Athens Concert Hall. The festival adds site-specific shows at other places across Attica, so check the venue on each event page.
How do you get tickets for the Athens festival?
Book through the official festival website, which sends you on to an online ticket platform. The Athens festival also lists its own ticketing information phone line. Each event sits in a day-by-day programme, so you pick the evening first.
On the home page of the festival site, a button reads Book your tickets. It links to an outside online ticketing platform, not to a shop on the festival site itself. The member page of the European Festivals Association also carries a Tickets link.
The one booking button covers the whole Athens festival programme, from Athens to Epidaurus. Search under the joint name, Athens Epidaurus Festival, rather than under each venue. That keeps you on the official route from the first click.
The site footer links to a Ticket Information page and a Terms and Conditions page. Both pages come in an English version. Read them before you book, since they hold the rules for your order.
The festival gives two phone lines: one for general questions and one for ticketing. Its office address is on Alkminis Street in Athens. Call the ticketing line if a detail on the booking page is unclear.
The programme page shows a calendar for the Athens festival, with each date listed in turn. Choose your evening there, then open the event page and follow the booking button. For Epidaurus nights, match the date with your travel plan before you buy.
Read the Ticket Information page for seat categories, concessions and surtitle languages. Ask the ticketing line about seats for wheelchair users before you choose a row.
Plan the booking around the outdoor nature of the main stages. The Odeon and both Epidaurus theatres are open-air ancient sites. Book the Athens festival evening first, then fit museums and tours around that fixed date.
How do you reach the Athens festival venues?
Each Athens festival stage has its own route. The Odeon of Herodes Atticus is a short walk from Akropoli station on metro Line 2. Peiraios 260 sits near Kallithea station on Line 1. Epidaurus is a long coach or car ride.
For the Odeon, ride the red line, also called M2, to Akropoli station. A travel guide puts the walk from the station at about 750 metres, or ten minutes. The entrance is on Dionysiou Areopagitou, the pedestrian street below the Acropolis.
The venue page for Peiraios 260 places it in the Tavros district. It shares a city block with the Athens School of Fine Art. To get there, take Line 1, the Athens-Piraeus Electric Railway, and leave the train at Kallithea station.
From the station, walk beside the railway tracks in the direction of Piraeus until you reach Dimitsanas Street. Turn right into Peiraios Street and cross it. The gate is a short way to the right. The entrance itself is on Polykratous Street.
Buses serve this Athens festival venue too. Routes 049 and 914 stop at the Yfantiria stop and at the School of Fine Art stop. Both stops are listed on the venue page.
Epidaurus is a different trip. The tour listings give coach times for the trip. One listing starts with a one-hour coach ride to the Corinth Canal. It ends with a two-hour coach ride from Epidaurus back to Athens.
The metro reaches both city stages. For lines, ticket types and station tips, read our Athens metro guide before your first evening out.
Which tours pair with the Athens festival?
Two kinds of day tour fit around an Athens festival evening. A morning on the Acropolis matches a night at the Odeon below it. A full-day coach trip to Mycenae, Nafplio and Epidaurus shows the Argolis by daylight.
The Odeon stands on the southwestern slope of the Acropolis, a travel guide notes. Another guide says you can only go inside the Odeon during concerts and festivals. So a morning tour shows the theatre from the hill. Your evening ticket then takes you through its gate.
The first Epidaurus listing lasts ten hours. It runs with a live guide or a recorded audio guide, depending on your language. It offers English, Dutch, French, German, Italian and three more languages. It starts and ends on Athanasiou Diakou Street in Athens.
That listing stops at the Corinth Canal for twenty minutes and at Mycenae for two hours. Nafplio gets an hour and a half, with lunch and a walk. Epidaurus gets eighty minutes. The listing notes that entry to the Epidaurus site is not included.
The second Epidaurus listing lasts eleven hours and travels by coach. A live guide speaks English. An audio guide adds ten languages, from Spanish to Japanese, with a virtual reality device. Pickup points include the Hellenic Parliament, Omonoia Square and Karaiskaki Square. It holds a 4.5 rating from 3,175 reviews.
A day this long fills the daylight hours. Keep your Athens festival evening in the city for another day. Our Epidaurus day trip from Athens page compares the routes in more detail.
Here is how the tours line up:
- Morning: an Acropolis tour, then an evening show at the Odeon below the hill.
- Free day: a ten or eleven-hour coach trip to Mycenae, Nafplio and Epidaurus.
- Night off from the programme: a bookable theatre show in Athens outside the festival.
Which festivals run in Athens besides the Athens festival?
Besides the Athens festival, the city holds a spring city festival and a science festival at Technopolis. A rebetiko festival runs in Gazi. A fourth name in search results, AthFest, belongs to Athens in the US state of Georgia.
The This is Athens City Festival is the spring festival of the capital. Its question page calls it an initiative of the City of Athens. The main event runs through the whole of late spring. Pop-up cultural events then continue through the rest of the year.
Its aim, the same page says, is to show both known and lesser-known places in Athens. Street parties are part of the programme. A visitor in late spring can join it before the Athens festival season gets going.
The Athens Science Festival is devoted to science, technology, innovation and art, its own site says. The city tourism site places it at Technopolis, the old gasworks in Gazi. It also aims to encourage young people to think about a career in science.
The Athens Rebetiko Festival is a three-day celebration of rebetiko and Greek music tradition, a news site reports. It is held in Gazi in autumn. Concerts sit beside talks, workshops, dance and music lessons and exhibitions.
AthFest Music and Arts Festival shows up in searches for the Athens festival. Its listing sits on the visitor site of Athens, Georgia, in the United States. It has no link with the Greek capital, so skip it when you plan.
For the wider calendar across the country, see our guide to Greek festivals by season.
What do visitors ask about the Athens festival?
Can you visit the Athens festival with children?
Yes, with limits. The venue page for Peiraios 260 lists children under six among the things not permitted. Check the page for your venue before you book a family evening at the Athens festival.
Are performances in Greek?
Each production has its own page on the festival site, and that page gives the language details. Read it before you buy a ticket for the Athens festival.
Is there seating for visitors with reduced mobility?
At Peiraios 260, the venue page says all areas of the theatre are accessible. Fully adapted toilets are available. Wikidata also lists this Athens festival venue as wheelchair accessible. Check the other venues on their own pages.
Which month suits the Athens festival?
Wikipedia records one concert in July at the Little Theatre of Ancient Epidaurus as part of the Athens festival. Exact dates change each season, so check the programme page before you fix your travel dates.
Can you combine the Athens festival with the Acropolis in one day?
Yes. A morning Acropolis tour and an evening show at the Odeon share the same hill. The Peiraios 260 rules bar late entry except during an interval, so arrive early at any venue.
Can you take photos during a performance?
No. The Peiraios 260 venue page bans photography, with or without flash, during a show. Sound and video recording are banned too, and so is the use of mobile phones.