ED2014 News

ThreeWeeks Editor’s Letter: Here we go again!

By | Published on Thursday 5 June 2014

caromoses2013

Ladies and gentleman, performers and punters, show-hypers and dream-makers, joke-tellers and gin-drinkers, basically the Edinburgh Festival massive one and all, yes, it’s that time of year again.

And there were you feeling certain we’d only just had Easter. Yet August is a-looming, and ThreeWeeks is landing in your special email-place once more.

Yes, the city of Edinburgh has mopped up after a brief invasion by the boys from One Direction, it’s powered up the trams that you might have assumed were simply an urban myth exploited by London stand-ups looking for a local angle, and, by edict from the Queen Of Scotland herself, we’ve all been given 25 days off from pre-referendum politicking come August to get down to the business of the world’s greatest ever cultural event. By which I mean another Edinburgh Festival kicks off in 55 days time. You’re all ready for it, right?

ThreeWeeks will return for its 19th consecutive year to cover it all. Which would make me feel very old if you weren’t all just taking to Twitter to remark on how I couldn’t have possibly been involved that first year, back in 1996, I mean, look at that photo, she was surely kids-programme-age back then, and couldn’t possibly have been propping up the bar at the Fringe Club (RIP) listening to Earl Okin explain how “the Fringe just isn’t as good as it used to be”. And if you’ve no idea what I’m talking about, no, neither do I.

So yes, Edinburgh Festival 2014. Biggest yet. It’s going to be marvellous and magnificent and exciting and excellent. And a total nightmare to navigate. Which is where we come in of course. Preview guide, weekly magazine, daily updates, website, podcast, all the usual bits n pieces, though with a few changes this year too. If you’re a performer, a punter, a publicist or simply a partly-preoccupied passer-by, read on to find out more.

And I’ll see you back here in your inbox soon, and dashing from venue to venue in Edinburgh come August.

Caro Moses

PS: This letter originally appeared as a ThreeWeeks Update email, which you can receive for free by signing up here.

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THREEWEEKS AT THE EDINBURGH FESTIVAL 2014

ThreeWeeks will return to the Edinburgh Festival for the 19th time this year, tapping into our editorial team’s nearly two decades of Fringe experience, and plenty of up-to-the-minute insights from our year-round sister site ThisWeek London, and the on-the-ground opinions of our Edinburgh review team.

Our popular preview guide will hit the streets in late July, available to pick up at all the key Festival venues as they open for business, and also pushed through the letter-boxes of over 15,000 homes across central Edinburgh. A vital guide to the Festival, the preview edition precedes the three main editions of the ThreeWeeks magazine, out on 6, 13 and 20 Aug, and packed with reviews, interviews, exclusive columns and show tips aplenty.

In addition to the magazine, you will get daily updates from ThreeWeeks by email, with the latest reviews, show recommendations, news bits and links to the latest features online. Because while the ThreeWeeks magazines are packed full of great stuff, the website has even more at www.ThreeWeeks.co.uk.

And there you’ll also find the popular ThreeWeeks podcast, which will fill your podcast-listening device of choice with interviews and performances from our favourite Fringe shows.

MORE NEWS AND FEATURES
When we set up ThreeWeeks in 1996, a key motivation was that the Festival, and especially the Fringe, was expanding rapidly, but at the same time the mainstream media were cutting their review teams. We sought to bridge that gap, by providing a new and vibrant team of reviewers, motivated to go out and find the shows and performers the existing newspapers and magazines were missing. And boy did we see an awful lot of shows along the way.

Nearly twenty years on – with the Festival continuing to grow each year – we’ve noticed that while a plethora of new review organisations have sprung up over the years, especially online, there is less news and feature coverage, monitoring the buzz and the grapevine, digging deeper and getting the back story on the most exciting new shows.

Interviews and exclusive columns have always been a key part of the ThreeWeeks mix and we’re pleased to announce that we’ll be stepping all this up even more this year – making ThreeWeeks to go-to place, in print and online, to get the full lowdown on the world’s greatest festival, and the people who make it happen.

THREEWEEKS REVIEWERS RETURN
A key part of the ThreeWeeks mission ever since 1996 has been to encourage and enable future media talent at the same time as discovering the best new acts and shows at the Festival. We’ve done this through our acclaimed media-skills programme, which has provided formal and on-the-ground training to hundreds of young writers over the years, who have formed our review teams at festivals past. We’re excited to reveal that we are in the process of overhauling and enhancing our training programme, which will relaunch all-new in 2015.

As a result, this summer we’ll be fielding a smaller review team mainly made up of alumni of our media-skills programme from the last decade. As always, we will make it our mission to discover and champion the great shows that aren’t getting the exposure elsewhere, keeping our ears to the ground (and the social networks), making good use of our two decades of experience, our year-round culture tipping operation, and our excellent team of reviewers, who will be checking out shows, performers and venues right across the Festival.

You will be able to check out our reviews in the ThreeWeeks magazine, and our show recommendations in the daily updates, though for links to ALL the reviews follow our @TWittique Twitter feed.

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STAND OUT FROM THE REST: ADVERTISING OPPORTUNITIES

In such a crowded market-place, with so many shows, it can be hard to stand out. Advertising in ThreeWeeks is a cost-effective way to get your production right in front of Edinburgh locals and ticket buyers just as they are making ticket-buying decisions.

Our preview guide is pushed through the letter-boxes of over 15,000 homes in central Edinburgh and is the perfect way to make an impact with that key local audience. Meanwhile all our weekly editions are available to pick up from all the key venues, and an ad ensures ticket-buyers across the Festival audience know about your show.

For details of ad packages and costs check www.threeweeksedinburgh.com/advertising and to discuss a package to suit your needs and budgets email TWadvertising@unlimitedmedia.co.uk.

But get in touch quick – our preview edition is starting to fill up.

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THISWEEK LONDON: SIGN UP

Finally, for all and any of you based in or near London, did you know we have a year-round sister website called ThisWeek London, providing daily cultural recommendations for the UK capital plus regular interviews with our favourite performers and creators?

You can get ThisWeek alerts via Twitter and Facebook, plus from next Thursday via a new weekly email bulletin. In the run up to August this will also include interviews with our favourite Fringe show performers. To receive this email you can sign up here.



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