The Song Festival takes place at a special outdoor amphitheatre in Tallinn. The stage is built with a beautiful curved wooden roof that carries sound out to the enormous audience. When tens of thousands of voices sing together under the open sky, it can send a tingle through everyone present.
The festival celebrates Estonian folk songs and choral music. It begins with choirs and folk dance groups processing through the streets of Tallinn — a parade of costumes and music that can last for hours. Then everything comes together at the main concert, where the massed choir fills the stage like a living sea of voices.
The Song Festival tradition is so important to Estonians that UNESCO added it — along with similar festivals in Latvia and Lithuania — to its list of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The singing tradition helped Estonians keep their language and identity alive over many centuries.
Children's choirs also participate in the Song Festival, and many Estonian children spend years singing in school choirs in the hope of one day standing on that famous stage. Learning to sing together is seen as an important part of growing up in Estonia.