TARGET 160928

THE UNTOLD FESTIVAL
CHAPTER 2: 2016

The "Untold Festival" is the largest annual electronic music festival held in Romania, taking place in the city of Cluj-Napoca.

The first edition of the festival, labeled "Chapter 1", took place in 2015, when Cluj-Napoca was appointed the European Youth Capital. "Chapter 1" was designated Best Major Festival by European Festival Awards 2015.

"Chapter 2" took place on 7 August, 2016. It is the one to be viewed for this Target of the Week. Like Chapter 1, the festival took place over a period of four days in the center of Cluj-Napoca, this time involving 10 stages.The stage pictured above was the main stage, so it is the main feature of this Target of the Week. Howeever, the activities and events were basically the same for all 10 stages.


"Chapter 2" was attended by more than 300,000 people. Some 600 young people donated blood to receive free or discounted tickets for the festival, in a popular "pay with blood" campaign that managed to raise 275 liters of blood for the transfusion centers in Cluj-Napoca and Bucharest. (Yes, in the heart of "Dracula Land", Transylvania).



The festival went from morning until very late at night, and the crowd never seemed to disperse throughout the whole four days, or through all the hours each day.

Since this event featured electronic music, there were no "bands" you would normally expect at a rock concert. Single musicians at electronic consoles made the music and were shown on large screens to the sides of the stage.


^{At this concert, the music was the thing - not the performers.}

And, of course, this was a music festival featuring electronic created music, so once darkness fell, it was only natural that the music had accompanying light- and fireworks displays synchronized to the music being played.





BUT THIS IS TRANSYLVANIA, AFTER ALL...

Since the music festival happened in Transylvania, Romania’s "Dracula Land", it was only proper that a "Pay with Blood" campaign was launched in partnership with the National Institute of Blood Transfusion. The campaign wanted to promote and encourage blood donations to Romania's Blood Banks, so until July 24, all blood donors from regional and county transfusion centers got cheaper Untold Festival tickets if they accessed untoldfestival.com and filled out the donor form. Moreover, those who donated blood at the mobile caravan in Bucharest’s Herastrau Park between July 17 and July 19, and at the Blood Transfusion Centre in Cluj-Napoca between July 20 and July 21, got fully paid one-day tickets to the festival.


^{And some of the lucky blood doners got the chance to go backstage to see the inner workings of the electronics.}

The Untold Festival,Chapter 3 will occur in Cluj-Napoca in 2017 from 3-6 August, 2017. See link below for more information.

FEEDBACK MAP



If you got impressions for which this feedback is insufficient, more information,
pictures and videos can be found at the following web sites:

Untold Festival web page (English) for the best information on travel, costs, etc.
Romania Insider
Wikipedia

Many thanks to Calin Coltea for this target.