Events and festivals in Burgundy-Franche-Comté on September 19-20, 2026: the Festival en Arc drew 50,000 spectators in 2024, while Pupillin carries its giant grape cluster and Ouanne marks the 52nd edition of its farm fair.
Forty-five volunteers behind a ten-day stage. In Arc-lès-Gray, the Halle Perrey runs on theatre from September 18 to 27. The Festival en Arc drew 50,000 spectators and 20,000 schoolchildren there in 2024, while Pupillin carries its giant grape cluster in procession and Ouanne marks the 52nd edition of its farm fair.
Fifty Thousand Spectators for the Halle Perrey
The Festival en Arc has taken over the Halle Perrey since 2011. Carried by a team of 45 volunteers over ten days of live performance, from September 18 to 27 (19-20/09 falls right in the middle), the festival drew more than 50,000 spectators and 20,000 schoolchildren in 2024. That number makes it one of the most attended theatre events in Burgundy-Franche-Comté and neighbouring Grand Est.
Theatre, comedy, music and shows for young audiences make up the programme. It changes every evening, never repeating the same genre on the same stage twice.
The Halle Perrey keeps that pace right through to the closing night on September 27.
Elsewhere in Burgundy-Franche-Comté
Two hundred authors, one whole city. In Besançon, they sign books at Livres dans la Boucle, heir to the Les Mots Doubs fair founded in 2002, under the Parc Chamars marquee, at Victor Hugo's birth house and across a hundred events open to every audience. Guérigny bets on scrap. At the Forges Royales, artist Sophie Juramy opens the Artistic Recycling Festival, where some thirty artists and craftspeople turn recovered wood, metal, textile and paper into original pieces. Talks, workshops and music round out the programme.
Eighty kilos of grapes, one procession. In the winemaking village of Pupillin, capital of the Ploussard grape, a cluster of that size is carried every third Sunday of September from the communal shed to the church for the Fête du Biou, an ancestral wine tradition. Chenôve turns back the clock for a weekend. The old village becomes a lively medieval quarter for the Fête de la Pressée, born in 1986 around the monumental 13th-century wine presses of the Dukes of Burgundy, with pressing demonstrations and tastings of bourru, the freshly pressed grape juice.
Two musical worlds, one stage. In Belfort, jazz and classical music answer each other at the Festival des Tourelles, born at the Château des Tourelles in Morvillars and founded in 2018 by cellist Olivia Gay and pianist-composer Thierry Maillard, built around the region's great wines. Kirsch has its own brotherhood. The AOC kirsch country holds its Cherry Fritter Fair in Fougerolles-Saint-Valbert every third Sunday of September, where more than sixty exhibitors welcome the Confrérie des Gousteurs de Kirsch, parading in ceremonial dress to induct new members at Château Bresson. Ouanne has counted since 1973. The Animation Ouanne Forterre association runs the Grande Foire Agricole de Ouanne, marking its 52nd edition this year with old and new farm machinery, farmyard animals, a craft exhibition inside the church, equestrian displays and a float parade.