The Edinburgh Festival doesn’t really exist. It is, in fact, a number of different festivals that all take place over a five week period in August (with a three week core which is what most people consider to be the Edinburgh Festival). To understand how it all works involves a quick history lesson.

The Edinburgh International Festival was launched in 1947. It aimed to bring together theatre companies from across the world in a gesture of post-war collaboration. To this day the Festival brings together some of the best theatre, dance and opera companies, orchestras and speakers from all over the world to take part in an innovative and exciting three week programme of arts and culture. The International Festival is led and programmed by one director – now the recently appointed Jonathan Mills – who sets the tone for each festival and cherry picks the companies that take part.

In that first year, back in 1947, eight smaller theatre companies recognised that huge audiences would be pulled to the Edinburgh by the International Festival. They seized on the opportunity to tap into that audience and took over smaller venues not being used by the main festival. And so the Edinburgh Festival Fringe was born (though it was a couple of years before people started calling it that).

The Fringe grew each year until it was considerably larger than the main festival, but as it grew it kept the informal and slightly erratic approach that had been behind its creation in 1947, something which developed into what some people call the ‘spirit of the Fringe’ – that is that ‘any theatre company who can raise the money and find a performance space is welcome’. To this day, the Edinburgh Fringe remains unprogrammed – there is no director, board or company who says what can or can’t be performed – anything goes (within the limits of the law, obviously). 

A Fringe Society was established in 1958 to oversee the administration of the Fringe, and it continues to do so today, as well as publishing a central programme, running a central box office and press office, coordinating street theatre on Edinburgh High Street, and providing resources and advice to companies and performers performing at the Fringe. It is easy to confuse the Fringe Society with the Festival Fringe itself – but they are in reality two separate things. The Festival Fringe is an erratic, informal and intangible beast, the Fringe Society is the organisation appointed (and in part funded) by performers and promoters at the Festival Fringe to coordinate centralised activities on their behalf. The Fringe Society does not produce or promote any events, with the exception of a programme of workshops for performers and Fringe Sunday, a special open air event, especially popular with Edinburgh families, featuring showcases from hundreds of Fringe shows and performers.

The Festival Fringe takes place in some 200 venues across the city, all independently run and all with their own artistic aims and ambitions. Most venues will be home to a number of performance spaces, and many venues are based in a number of different buildings around Edinburgh. Some venues invite specific companies to perform in their spaces, while others invite any one with a show to perform to rent space (most do a bit of both). Each venue will publish their own programme and run their own box office (some venues work together on these), in addition to the central programme and box office run by the Fringe Society.

Venues at the Fringe vary hugely from year round theatres to grand looking churches to major concert halls to expertly converted bespoke Festival venues to back rooms in pubs. Some are very posh and plush, others less so. Others a lot less so!

Some of the bigger and longer established venues enjoy a higher profile, mainly because they tend to host some of the bigger name artists and companies. These include the so called ‘big four’ - The Pleasance, Assembly, Gilded Balloon and Underbelly – as well as the ever growing empire of C Venues, and Edinburgh’s year round new writing theatre the Traverse. The Spiegelgarden has also grown in profile in recent years, forming a hub alongside Bristo Square which also houses venues from three of the big four.

But the smaller venues also offer fantastic programmes, and often stage some of the real gems of the Festival – these include the Hill Street Theatre, Bongo Club, Sweet, Bedlam Theatre, Augustines, Greyfriar Kirkhouse, Aurora Nova, Rocket, Roman Eagle Lodge, Diverse Attractions, Venue 45, Venue 13 and, for comedy, Edinburgh’s year round comedy venue The Stand and the pubs operated as comedy clubs during August by the Free Fringe.

Within the Fringe are a number of other mini-festivals which offer a specific programme of events. These include the Festival Of British Youth Orchestras and T On The Fringe. To complicate matters further some of the big comedy or theatre promoters (the companies who represent the big comedians and theatre companies) often refer to their programmes of shows as being ‘festivals’ in their own right. But really all of those programmes are part of the larger Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Since 1947 a number of other festivals have been launched, all taking place in August alongside the International Festival and the Fringe. These include:

The Edinburgh Book Festival – possibly the best literary festival on the planet, combining book readings and author based events with debates and discussions based around recent book releases, and involving the writers behind them.

The Edinburgh Jazz & Blues Festival – a festival of great jazz and blues talent from across Scotland, and the wider jazz world.

The Festival Of Politics – a festival of talks, debates, discussions and other political events based in the Scottish Parliament.

The Edinburgh Interactive Entertainment Festival – a festival for the gaming industry, mainly aimed at people working in the industry, but with some gaming based events for the general public too.

Edinburgh Military Tattoo – the British army’s contribution to the Festival, a massive show featuring piping, marching and lots of tartan. The Tattoo takes over Edinburgh Castle every August, and sells out almost as soon as tickets go on sale.

Edinburgh Art Festival – an umbrella name for the many great exhibitions taking place in Edinburgh’s galleries during August.

Edinburgh Mela – a three day intercultural extravaganza, aimed mainly at Edinburgh locals.

Edinburgh People’s Festival – a unions supported ‘by the people for the people’ cultural programme, aimed very much at Edinburgh locals.

Edinburgh International Television Festival – the UK TV industry’s flagship annual festival, although primarily an industry focused event.

(Another of these festivals is the Edinburgh International Film Festival, though as of 2008 that will not take place during August).

Add to this all the events that take place in Edinburgh during August that are not affiliated to any of the festivals, put it altogether in one box, and that is the Edinburgh Festival. Needless to say, it is huge and, while somewhat complicated, it offers simply the most exciting, diverse and eclectic mix of arts, culture and entertainment from all over the world, all in one place at one time. The Edinburgh Festival is simply the biggest and bestest festival on the planet.