Festivals Get Bookish

Two Swiss festivals are in the process of putting out books to commemorate their recent anniversaries.

The 1,530-capacity Avo Session Basel, which closed its 25th anniversary edition Nov. 14 after pulling 19,000 people to its 14 shows, has a comprehensive jubilee book in the works.

Paléo Festival Nyon has just published “La Magie de l’Ephémère,” a book charting its 35-year history. It’s written in French but anyone who doesn’t speak the language can still enjoy the hundreds of photographs tracing the event back to 1976.

Most of the congratulatory 35th birthday messages from acts that have played the festival are written in English and include personal notes from R.E.M., Motorhead, Franz Ferdinand, Placebo, Iggy Pop and Amy Macdonald.

The book pays homage to the thousands of artists who have contributed to the success of the event, which has been short-listed for the “Medium sized Festival” category of this year’s European Festival Awards.

The winners will be announced Jan. 12 during the Eurosonic-Noorderslag Festival at Groningen, The Netherlands.

The acts helping Avo Session celebrate its 25th included Jamiroquai, Sheryl Crow, Anastacia, Ray Davies, Justin Nozuka, Razorlight, Joe Jackson, Robert Plant and Mary J. Blige.

The festival’s annual Lifetime Achievement Award and Musician’s Musician Award went respectively to Davies and Blige.

This year’s run of concerts, which did 96 percent business with several sellouts, featured two acts per evening.

The organisers report the experiment was a success and that some fans who went to see one act in particular ended up becoming quite a fan of the other.

The book detailing Avo’s 25 years is expected to be published in February.