This Saturday is the largest Folklore Festival held in São Miguel, one of the largest in the Azores, well-known nationally and internationally. It is the Great Festival of Folklore of the Grass – Folkloric Show of the Atlantic, that this year goes in the twenty-sixth edition.
For the last twenty-six years, the 1st Saturday of August is considered to be the day of Folklore par excellence, due to the accomplishment of this great event of popular culture, where the roots, the cause of the existence and identity of the peoples are in evidence and highlighted.
In the first years of its accomplishment, it was affirmed as a spectacle of high cultural level, a retail of traditions, deserved the great commitment of the Parish Council of the Relva and of the Folk Group of Cantares and Balhados da Relva, deserving from the moment the recognition of the Federation of Portuguese Folklore.
Always integrated in the secular Festivals of Senhora das Neves, which this weekend take place in this very old parish of São Miguel, it is without a doubt the largest tourist poster of the civic and cultural program of Relva.
Thus, this Saturday, August 4 at 19:30 hours will be the delivery of souvenirs at the Civic Center and Cultural Relay and at 20:00 hours the concentration of Participating Groups in the same place, can attend at 20:30 hours folkloric parade and ethnographic, along Rua da Guiné (North side) and Rua de Cima, where the traditional costumes and dances to parade will make us retreat a few centuries ago.
From 21:00 hours onwards, the official opening of the XXVI Relva Great Folk Festival – Folkloric Show of the Atlantic, in the 5 de Agosto Garden, will take place, a festively decorated space and a stage that to bake bread, hard work, experiences of the people of this parish, as in many others for centuries and still lived today, at 21:15 hours to start the activities of invited groups:
Folklore Ranch of Livramento House; Folkloric Dance Group The Iesselschotsers Steenderen – The Netherlands; Folk and Ethnographic Group of S. Pedro – Vila Franca do Campo; Trofa Folkloric Ranch – Entre Douro e Minho Portuguese Continent; Folkloric Group Ilha Verde – Ponta Delgada; Folklore Ensemble Bystrina Slovakia and Folkloric Group of Cantares e Balhados da Relva.
Around 24:00 hours, the Festival will close, followed by a meeting of all groups in the Cultural and Recreation Hall of Nossa Senhora das Neves.
The realization of this festival brings us folklore from other places, such as this year in which São Miguel, Entre Douro and Minho, the Netherlands and Slovakia are present, as well as other regions and countries that over the years have passed through.
Complete program
19:30 – Ceremony for the delivery of souvenirs at the Civic and Cultural Center.
20:00 – Concentration in the Relva Civic and Cultural Center of all the Participating Groups.
20:30 – Folklore and Ethnographic Parade through Rua da Guiné (north side) and Rua de Cima.
21:00 – Opening of the XXVI Relva Great Festival of Folklore – Folkloric Show of the Atlantic.
21:15 – Beginning of XXVI Relva Great Festival of Folklore – Folkloric Show of the Atlantic, in Jardim 5 de Agosto, with the participation of the following groups:
- Folk Ranch of the Livramento House
- Folkloric Dance Group The Iesselschotsers Steenderen – Netherlands
- Folk and Ethnographic Group of S. Pedro – Vila Franca do Campo
- Folk Ranch of Trofa, Entre Douro e Minho Mainland Portugal
- Folk Group Ilha Verde – Ponta Delgada
- Folklore Ensemble Bystrina – Slovakia
- Folk Group of Cantares e Balhados da Relva
24:00 – Closing, followed by socializing, at the Cultural and Recreational Hall of Nossa Senhora das Neves