The message - quality and diversity Inspired by the initiative of the great conductor Igor Markevitch and eminent philosopher Denis De Rougemont, many artistic figures formed the European Festivals Association in 1952 in Geneva. Today we pay tribute to their devotion to artistic integrity and social mission of festivals. All our recent initiatives to enlarge EFA activities are performed in the same spirit: to contribute to the development of European culture based on quality and diversity. Arts festivals belonging to the Association struggle against the commercialisation of culture. Today EFA membership takes an important part in the European cultural cooperation (in different forms : exchange of programmes, artistic workshops, training programmes, study-trips, conferences, international productions, co-productions, common projects, the European Festivals Data Centre in Brussels). This message will appear in three "central" forms : A festival of festivals representing cultural diversity, historical tradition and avantgarde ; An international conference (with a following publication) on the arts festivals from the aspect of cultural philosophy, aesthetics and sociology ; A document addressed to a large public and to public authorities : the Charter of European Festivals. The central events cannot represent all the rich diversity of member-festivals. Their own programmes - with productions and co-productions dedicated to the anniversary - will belong to the important message (with a certain level of "general context" of historical elements and with elements of "artistic futurology"). The anniversary Festival will be held in Geneva, Coppet and Lausanne from October 11th to 17th. Summarizing the main cultural currents of European performing arts, the themes of the event will be : · In memoriam Pablo Casals · Mittel - Europa · Musica Antiqua · Musica Nova · Musica sacra · Crescendo · Theatre · Opera · In memoriam Olivier Messiaen · In memoriam Franz Liszt · Dance theatre A detailed programme is available on the page about "A Festival of Festivals"