The festival will bring a range of shows to Tallinn's streets with the aim of shining a spotlight on lesser-known cultural creators and forms.  

Tallinn's Deputy Mayor Kaarel Oja (SDE) said this year's festival "focuses on the fringes, inviting artists and cultural forms that operate outside the cultural center. We want to draw attention to the diversity of our cultural landscape and remind everyone that differences enrich us."

Describing itself as a one-night cultural festival in an urban space, Kultuuriöö begins at 4:30 p.m. with a panel discussion on the intersection of alternative and mainstream culture.

Shows will last into the early hours of Saturday morning, with a DJ line-up at New Wave Club ending at 4 a.m.

Spread across Tallinn's city districts, the festival features everything from a surprise picnic concert by Polina Tšerkassova in Laagna Community Garden to a pop-up café, performances, and street art in the courtyard of the Northern Estonian Association of the Blind. Rising stars of electronic music An-Marlen and biopepperoni will feature alongside indie band Ouu and others on the main stage at Harjumägi. 

The festival overlaps with two youth music festivals in Põhja-Tallinn. "Uusmus" hosts young musicians playing original music, while "Our Music 2024" has an outdoor stage featuring jazz, rock, alternative indie, and world music.

Kultuuriöö's theme this year, "Boundary Horizons", points to the festival's goal of paying attention to "alternative forms of culture operating in peripheral areas".

The festival is in its eighth year, having launched in 2015 at the initiative of Tallinn's Culture Department. It aims to showcase Tallinn's broad cultural "creativity, versatility and diversity."

 Last year the festival's theme focussed on young people, with festivities concentrated in Tallinn's Old Town but spreading out to Pirita and Lasnamäe. The festival returns each year on the last Friday or Saturday of August.

More details and the full event program are available here. The main program events are free.

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