International Music Festivals

International music festivals have been a top priority of the summer for many music lovers since the days of Woodstock. Music events take place all over the world, gathering the crème de la crème of any given genre for the listening pleasure of children, adults, and everyone else in between. From folk music to jazz festivals and the blues, there are international music festivals for all tastes and purposes, including music events which are not an end in themselves, but a mean to achieve something greater, such as Farm Aid, Live Aid and Live 8, which had the privilege of reuniting the classic line up of Pink Floyd for the first time in almost a quarter of a century.

The most well known rock festival is arguably Woodstock, which took place in New York in 1969. This music festival featured some of the biggest names of the time, like Santana, Joan Baez, Grateful Dead, Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Who, Jefferson Airplane, Joe Cocker and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young; on the other hand it sadly lacked performances by The Beatles, Bob Dylan, The Doors and Black Sabbath. There were two more editions 25 and 30 years later after the original, with performing bands and artists the likes of Candlebox, Collective Soul, Jackyl, Sheryl Crow, Blind Melon, Rollins Band, NIN, Metallica, Aerosmith, Cranberries, Primus with Jerry Cantrell, Spin Doctors, Bob Dylan, RHCP, Peter Gabriel and Green Day; and Buckcherry, Live, The Offspring, Korn, Bush, Everclear, Kid Rock, Counting Crows, Alanis Morissette, Godsmack, Megadeth and Creed with Robby Krieger, respectively.

Rock in Rio is another one of the truly international music festivals, taking place not only in Brazil but also in Portugal and Spain, with potential future outings in Mexico or Colombia. Bands who have performed at this music festival over the years are Queen, Iron Maiden, Whitesnake, Rod Stewart, James Taylor, AC/DC, Scorpions, Ozzy Osbourne, Yes, INXS, Billy Idol, Guns n' Roses, Faith No More, Sepultura, Sting, R.E.M, Foo Fighters, Oasis, Papa Roach, Silverchair, Slipknot, Motorhead, System of a Down, Seether, Evanescence, Bon Jovi and many more.

Two other international music festivals which are also tours are Lollapalooza and Ozzfest. Lollapalooza was created by Perry Farrel of Jane's Addiction, and while in 2005 it was stationary in Grant Park, Chicago, throughout its history it has visited many cities in the United States and Canada, and in 2011 it went overseas for the first time ever and debuted in Santiago, Chile. Ozzfest, on the other hand, was founded by Black Sabbath frontman Ozzy Osbourne in 1996, precisely the year Lollapalooza refused to take him. Since its inception, Ozzfest has been more than a simple music festival, a showcase for up-and-coming, as well as well established hard rock and heavy metal acts.