The Festival was first organized by a well-known saxophone player, composer, producer, and director of a legendary jazz-band «Arkhangelsk» Vladimir Petrovich Rezitsky in 1982. Since their early days «Jazz Days» were oriented on promotion of new jazz not to detriment of traditional schools – in the framework of the Festivals the two trends are usually presented on different days. «Jazz Days» hosted many stars of the world jazz during, and they attract musicians from all over Russia, as well as from Norway, Latvia, Estonia, Sweden, USA, Great Britain, Germany. Since 2002 «Jazz Days» acquired new driving force thanks to the «Jazz Development Foundation» directed by a musician, producer and public figure Vladimir Turov. At present «Jazz Days» are a music laboratory where young talented jazzmen of Arkhangelsk and the Region have a chance of professional growth under the guidance of prominent Russian and foreign musicians playing together on one stage within the framework of the «Jazz ‘Relay-Race’» Project. The «Jazz Days» Festival has the following peculiarities:

• In 2007 there will be the 25th traditional Festival held in Arkhangelsk;
• The Festival usually takes place at the end of September - the beginning of October each year;
• The unique concert programme is always accompanied by exhibitions, installations, excursions, master-classes, films and video art events, music, lively club events;
• The audience is more than 2000 people annually;
• There is a chance to make a jazz air tour to the Solovki together with the jazz musicians, Russian and foreign tourists and jazz lovers.

It was organized in 2005 by a producer, director of the «Jazz Development Foundation» Vladimir K. Turov in Arkhnagelsk as a festival of avant-garde school of jazz music. The festival is a «a combination of fine and serious music, challenge, defiance and humour, all on the same day, close to the day when Vladimir Lenin was born.»

«April Jazz Theses» is peculiar for:

• 1 day-trip into the world of contemporary and revolutionary music culture;
• Over 600-700 people come to listen annually;
• Artists, musicians from Switzerland, Japan, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Norway have been guests of the Festival.

International Street Theatres Festival

The 1st International Street Theatres Festival took place in Arkhangelsk in 1990. Since then the Arkhangelsk Young People’s Theatre has held twelve festivals.

The International Street Theatres Festival is called upon for acquainting the Region population with new trends in contemporary theatre, for attracting more audience, for educating it through the means of theatre, and is directed to strengthen cultural ties of Russia with foreign countries. For more details...

As an experiment, the festival called «Prikosnovenye – 1» was first realized on the 19th - 25th of June, 2000, by the theatre «Drugoi Tanets» (‘A Different Dance’) directed by Nikolai Shchetnev and backed by the Regional Information and Analysis Centre on Culture and Tourism and groups from Saint-Petersburg, Moscow, and Yaroslavl. The aim of the Festival is to promote contemporary dance schools on the territory of Russia. For more details...

In 1999 a celebration was revived devoted to a celestial defender of the town Kirill Velsky (St. Cyril of Velsk). The celebration follows some old traditions. One of the days of the event begins with the Common of saints at the Uspenskaya (Dormition) Church. After the Common of saints an icon-bearing procession follows along the main street of Velsk. The celebration lasts for several days, and starts with a symposium «Drevo Zhizny» (‘The Tree of Life’) devoted to wooden sculpture.

Solvychegodsk is a town with a considerable literary heritage. Thanks to the creative fantasy of Aleksey Tolstoy and the Zhemchuzhnikov brothers, a literary character Kuzma Prutkov, a lyric poet, a philosopher, a man of fine feelings, was «born» not far from the town on the Vychegda River on the 11th of April, 1801.

In 1998 there appeared an idea to arrange a Festival of Kuzma Prutkov. The object of the Festival is to attract people’s attention to the historic and literary heritage of Solvychegodsk, to revive social and cultural life of the town.

The geography of the Holiday participants is wide: guests from Koryazhma, Kotlas, the Kotlassky, Vilegodsky and Verkhnetoemsky Districts, Arkhangelsk and Severodvinsk, Syktyvkar, Moscow and Saint-Petersburg are welcomed by the town of Solvychegodsk. The festival is a good opportunity for poets and bards, musicians and theatre lovers, artisans and artists to meet. The Festival days are busy with seminars and conferences of the creative forces, with summing up of the numerous competitions.

The Kargopol land is rich in folk crafts and arts, and this festival is devoted to the people who have become true professionals, to the families of craftsmen, masters and their pupils. On the Festival programme there are many interesting meetings, folk performances and cultural events, master-classes in clay toys making, weaving, birch skin carving, bus tours and walking excursions, talks to the Kargopol inhabitants of whom the land is very proud!