Festivals and events in Pays de la Loire on August 22 and 23, 2026: rap and metal share five stages at V and B Fest'

On August 22 and 23, 2026, the festivals of Pays de la Loire close the summer: V and B Fest' wraps four days in Château-Gontier, Beaufou celebrates Vendée farming, Tuffé fires its display over the lake.

Four days, five stages.

V and B Fest' takes over the Domaine de la Maroutière in Château-Gontier-sur-Mayenne through Sunday, August 23. Around it, late-summer events fill the whole region: Vendée farming at Beaufou, the Tufféeries fireworks over the lake at Tuffé, two baroque weeks opening on the same Saturday.

Five stages at the Domaine de la Maroutière

More than 135,000 festivalgoers in 2025: V and B Fest' is the largest music gathering in Pays de la Loire this weekend. It runs at the Domaine de la Maroutière in Château-Gontier-sur-Mayenne from August 20 to 23 and closes on Sunday.

The festival only dates back to 2019.

The association L'Opus Sonore runs it, backed by the V and B chain that gave it its name. Five stages share a line-up that settles on nothing: rock, pop, electro, rap and metal follow one another on the same boards.

Metal and rap sharing a bill at this scale stays unusual. That mix is what pushed the event into the front rank of festivals in western France, in barely seven years.

The town has more on: the Ursulines cloister hosts Quel Cirque ! until August 25, a free circus-arts programme based in Château-Gontier-sur-Mayenne since 2012.

Ploughing at Beaufou, fireworks at Tuffé

The Fête de l'Agriculture de Vendée brings its ploughing contests, its moiss'batt cross and its petting farm to Beaufou on August 22 and 23, moving to a different canton every year since 1986. At Tuffé-Val-de-la-Chéronne, the Festival des Tufféeries packs everything into 22/08/2026: concerts, entertainment, then fireworks over the lake in front of several thousand spectators.

The Jeunes Agriculteurs de Vendée run the Beaufou event and draw tens of thousands of visitors around farming, concerts and fireworks included. The Comité des Fêtes de Tuffé, for its part, fits everything into a single day, and its festival ranks among the big summer dates in eastern Sarthe.

Metal shuts up shop on Saturday.

At Champtoceaux, in the commune of Orée-d'Anjou, thirty minutes from Nantes, Barbeuk Metal Fest plays its second and final day, mixing emerging French bands with international names, from hard rock to extreme metal, on a deliberately small scale.

On the edge of Le Mans, Les Siestes Teriaki occupy the grounds of the Abbaye Royale de l'Épau at Yvré-l'Évêque from August 21 to 23: three free days where art music meets popular music, sound experiments and visual installations, as every late August since 2001. The Teriaki association runs it with the Sarthe department and Sarthe Culture.

Baroque at Savennières, salt marshes at La Guittière

Two weeks of baroque music open on the same Saturday. At Savennières, the village church hosts concerts from August 22 to 28, in the middle of a vineyard listed as UNESCO World Heritage. At Thiré, the Festival dans les Jardins de William Christie runs until August 29 with concerts, musical walks and candlelit meditations across twelve hectares listed as a historic monument, co-produced by Les Arts Florissants and the Vendée department.

On Sunday, the salt workers open their marshes.

At La Guittière, a village in the commune of Talmont-Saint-Hilaire, the Fête du Sel gives August 23 over to the white gold of the Vendée coast, guided tours of the salt pans included. In Nantes, Le Voyage à Nantes follows its green line, painted on the ground over more than sixteen kilometres, until September 6, past contemporary artworks, monumental installations and heritage sites.

At Les Siestes Teriaki and Quel Cirque !, admission costs nothing.