Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 1 March 2023. – 3 March is the day: the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Drag Queen Gala will celebrate its 25th anniversary. It marks a quarter of a century over which the Drag Queen throne aspirants have not only gained great popularity among the general public in the main festivities of the city, but also in which the event has become the unique sign of identity of a Carnival that has just been designated a Fiesta of International Tourist Interest by the Spanish state.

Up to 14 participants will compete for the sceptre that marks out the Drag Queen in a Gala featuring a star performance by American pop rock singer Anastacia. The event will be broadcast on television and social media (@lpacarnaval) for the whole planet to see. The Gala on Friday 3 March (9:15 pm, GMT+0) is a big event within the universe of Drag, an important date for Carnival and a unique show for spectators from outside the island. With tickets sold out for the show in the 2023 purpose-built Studio 54 in Santa Catalina Park, the social networks, using hashtag #draglpgc, will be the main hosts for comments on this great contest of the platforms. So much so, that year after year it climbs the ranks to become #TT Worldwide.

The Drag Queen coronation opens the last weekend of the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Carnival in 2023. That same night, various concerts will take place on the two stages around the Plaza de la Música, located at the far western edge of the famous Las Canteras beach. There, a crowd of people in costumes will once more gather to enjoy yet another dose of Carnival, to be followed, on Saturday 4 March, by the celebration of the Grand Parade as it makes its way all around the city.

The Grand Parade

This parade, a historic feature in the programme, has been a real symbol, conveying the character of the Carnival of the capital of Gran Canaria ever since 1976, when, less than a year after Franco’s death and in the midst of the downfall of the dictatorship, the citizens recovered a secular tradition for their city. The tradition of Carnival, fancy dress, irreverence and freedom.

The Parade, with its long line of floats (over a hundred) where many celebrate this evening with different types of music and to different beats, leaves at 5:00 pm from the iconic Castillo de La Luz (the former fortress which defended the city from Barbary pirate raids) and continues along the whole length of the city centre until coming to a stop in San Telmo Park, the gateway to the historic quarter of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (Triana and Vegueta, the earliest heart of the city). The whole event is about partying and having fun, two qualities that are never missing from the organisers’ agenda. The night ends on a high with concerts in El Rincón, next to the Plaza de la Música, and in San Telmo.

Sunday celebration in Santa Catalina

Sunday 5 March sees no slowing down in the partying. Starting at noon, a Daytime Carnival will again be held in the area around the Plaza de la Música and Santa Catalina, as well as in San Telmo. At 3:00 pm an international Carnival event with the Colombian musician Carlos Vives will take place on the stage in Santa Catalina Park. The artist will be the star of the last day of this year’s Carnival before the Burial of the Sardine retinue sets off from the same location at around 7:00 pm for Las Canteras. There, after arriving accompanied by the cortege of mourning widows and costumed participants, the fish will go up in flames and fireworks will be set off to bid farewell to the Carnival until its return in 2024.

Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 27 February 2023. The 2023 Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Carnival has a Queen: Lola Ortiz was crowned on Friday 24 February on the spectacular stage in Santa Catalina Park. It is a “Studio 54” built to set the scene for a festival dedicated this year to the world of the legendary New York club, and has had one of those weekends that best illustrate the meaning and spirit of the celebration in the city.

Lola triumphed in a gala with eleven contestants for the crown, also featuring the international supermodel Nieves Álvarez as co-presenter and the Venezuelan singer-songwriter Carlos Baute, broadcast live on the public networks RTVE and RTVC. The night showed the world the spectacular and unique dresses worn by the candidates: original creations prepared for months by the designers, whose work showcases all the colour of the Las Palmas Carnival.

The celebrations include everyone: from the thousands of members of the public in fancy dress who enjoyed the music and events of the “Daytime Carnival” in Santa Catalina to the families and younger carnival-goers, also in their costumes, who were able to enjoy the Children’s Parade held on the afternoon of Sunday 26 February.

Up till then, the Carnival had been going non-stop in the park, with a great parade of groups (murgas, comparsas, drag queens and the Queen herself) on Saturday 25th, Carlos Baute’s concert that night, and the unique Dog Carnival held on Sunday morning with 15 candidates (and their owners) in a contest that is also a hallmark of the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Carnival. The pets in their costumes reflect the openness of the festival programme to every kind of audience. All this in a weekend that concluded with the satirical songs of the entertaining chirimurgas in the park

The Carnival was also supplemented on these evenings by the concerts in the setting of the Plaza de la Música, at the western end of Las Canteras beach, with stages for performances by artists of various kinds, in front of thousands of people who experience these weeks with special intensity.

The climax of the programme, however, will come on Friday 3 March, with the Drag Queen Gala, in which 14 candidates will strut their stuff in Santa Catalina Park, which will once again become a global showcase for the festival and the city.

Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 20 February 2023. The Drag Queen Gala in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year in the 2023 Carnival, dedicated to the world of the legendary disco Studio 54. A quarter of a century, no less, of an event that has become the unique distinctive feature of the Las Palmas festival. Indeed, drag has achieved the greatest global impact as the face of a celebration that Spain has just declared a Festival of International Tourist Interest: the gala is followed on television, social media and conventional and digital news channels all over the world. And its platform shoes have become a trademark of the modern Carnival.

The festival still maintains the major traditional events on its agenda (the contests for murgas and comparsas, the election of the Carnival Queen, the children’s programme), and in the new century it has gradually incorporated attractions that are now well established (the International Body Painting Contest and the Dog Carnival). And it has confirmed its image as a special celebration, not only for the way it is experienced in the street, but also for the appeal and pulling power of its platform-soled stars.

The city, an urban tourist destination in which visitors share everyday life with the locals in a totally natural way, daringly and audaciously adopted this innovative contest at the end of the twentieth century. Las Palmas de Gran Canaria has always been an open, cosmopolitan city, whose Port of La Luz, a key logistical centre for Atlantic shipping, is a permanent gateway. However, 25 years ago society in general had not yet evolved as far as the current model of coexistence and diversity.

The very fact that a small group of people involved in the artistic direction and production of the Carnival took the step of conceiving and proposing a drag contest in the city was a real demonstration of the free-spirited nature of Las Palmas. These people found out about an incipient contest for transvestites being held in the south of Gran Canaria: the island’s major tourist area, which also had a specific space for the LGTBI community in its vicinity.

The ideas captured in that contest, inspired by the world of the film The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, by Stephan Elliott (1994), and the aesthetics and style of emerging stars like RuPaul confirmed the original concept of the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Gala. The great contest was eventually scheduled in the programme and grew year by year, so much so that a finalists’ preselection phase was needed: there are many drag artists wanting to be included in the grand final night in Santa Catalina Park on its sumptuous stage.

From the first moment in the history of the gala, several participants added their characteristic platform shoes, the unique figure of the Drag Queen emerged, and year by year these contests have been capturing attention within the city and the island and beyond. On Friday 3 March the 2023 Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Carnival’s Drag Queen Gala will once again be the focus of attention of the worldwide drag phenomenon.

Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 14 February 2023. The Studio 54 Carnival is also a party for the whole family, and something for its youngest members to enjoy. As is the case every year, the most popular celebration in Las Palmas de Gran Canarias includes a special section presented as a Children’s Carnival, one of the highlights of the programme for the main weekend of this 2023 festival dedicated to the world of the legendary New York disco club.

It consists of the Children’s Gala, which will be held on Sunday 19 February (at 6.30 pm, free admission until full capacity is reached) on the main stage in Santa Catalina Park. At this gala the youngest monarch of the festivities will be chosen, with five girls and two boys competing for the position of Junior Queen or King, supported by their respective sponsors, with costumes on which their designers have spared no effort (often also linked to the main Carnival Queen contest). This event can be followed live on TVC (Canary Islands TV) and also via the Carnival distribution list on the organisers’ YouTube profile: Promotion of the City of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria or on the Carnival’s international social media channels: LPACarnival on Fb or LPACarnaval on Ig.

Before this event, the Studio 54 Carnival actually had a full-scale preview with the children’s fancy dress festival held in Santa Catalina Park on 12 February: a real party for the youngest members of the family. As many as 1,150 children from 32 schools and art and dance academies participated in this costume matinée in front of 3,500 spectators: clear evidence of the strong family appeal of the Las Palmas Carnival. The day before, on 11 February, children’s murgas and comparsas regaled a large audience with their talent and commitment to continue being part of the festivities in the years to come, at the Children’s Group Event.

Carnival Tuesday

The children’s schedule is interwoven with the events on the big day, Carnival Tuesday, 21 February, in the daytime celebrations around Santa Catalina Park, in which various audiences share spaces from midday onwards. This is one of the highlights of a festival that also includes another event of special interest for families: the well-established Dog Carnival, which has been part of the programme for more than a decade.

As well as attracting the many tourists who visit the city during this period, it also brings together young and old alike in the crowds that attend the show that morning. It will take place on Sunday 26 February, with free admission until full capacity is reached, all for the sake of enjoying a parade of costumed pets that always arouse the admiration of the audience. It will be followed by more concerts in the same area for a range of audiences.

Children’s Parade

On that same Sunday, but in the afternoon, the young ones will have their big event: the Great Children’s Parade, a cavalcade of carriages and costumes with a long tradition in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. It is the best proof of how central a place the days devoted to the youngest participants occupy in the carnival programme.

The “junior” cavalcade will depart from the Castillo de la Luz at 5 pm and make its way to Santa Catalina Park, where it will reach its festive climax with a plan designed exclusively for the audience of children. It is the big popular date for these carnival-goers, always accompanied by their families at these events.

The Studio 54 Carnival will come to an end on Sunday 5 March, with the usual Burial of the Sardine: the parade that accompanies a large figure of the fish from Santa Catalina, to be burned on Las Canteras Beach, always with spectacular fireworks. The viudas (widows) have pride of place in a procession joined, once again, by participants of all kinds. The timetable (it starts at 7 pm) also allows many families to come and bid farewell to their Carnival, albeit in a somewhat irreverent manner.

The 2023 Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Carnival marks the return of the festival without restrictions, after the years affected by the impact of the pandemic. The carnivals of Gran Canaria’s capital adapted and maintained their connection with the public and their international reach. However, this year’s programme allows the street celebrations to get back into full swing. Day and night. And with a full schedule of free concerts.

Carlos Baute and Carlos Vives in Santa Catalina

The theme of these celebrations focuses on the iconic New York club Studio 54 and the extensive soundtrack provided by the Disco music of the 70s, although the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Carnival always has a space of its own for Latin and contemporary rhythms. As far as the Daytime Carnival is concerned, in Santa Catalina Park, where the festival stage is set up every year (hosting the main galas and contests), the programme includes several events in the winter sun, ideal for dancing and partying.

After the Murgas and the Comparsas competitions, and the Children’s and Grand Dame galas, Santa Catalina will host its first Daytime Carnival on Tuesday 21 February, Carnival Tuesday, with several popular local groups livening up a day that will conclude with the prestigious International Body Painting Contest on stage. It will be a foretaste of more high-profile musical events in that same space.

On Saturday 25 February, after the Grand Parade of Carnival Groups, the Venezuelan singer-songwiter Carlos Baute will give a keenly awaited concert in the park (10 pm), which will mark his return to the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Carnival. The following morning, Sunday 26, music will be heard again in Santa Catalina with another powerful performance by local bands from 1 pm, once the famous Dog Carnival has finished.

Finally, once the Studio 54-themed Carnival has crowned its Drag Queen on the last weekend of the programme, Carlos Vives will be the star of the closing event of the festivities in Santa Catalina, on Sunday 5 March, in a concert scheduled for 3 pm (after another Daytime Carnival, this one in San Telmo). This will be the prelude to the Burial of the Sardine, which brings the events to an end with a parade from Santa Catalina to Las Canteras Beach.

Two stages next to Las Canteras

At the same time, the Carnival Nights will have an extensive repertoire of performances in the Plaza de la Música, located next to the Alfredo Kraus Auditorium, an emblematic cultural icon of the city, named in honour of the immortal tenor (a native of Las Palmas), whose figure can be seen in an imposing sculpture, right next to it, that dominates the western end of Las Canteras Beach. There, at the end of the beach and in the shelter of the Auditorium, the Studio 54  carnival has two stages set up for the concerts: Disco Salsa and Dance Urban.

From Friday 10 February to Sunday 5 March, the Plaza de la Música will be the central night-time location for the festival’s dancing and music, with performances from 9 pm to 3 am. On Carnival Tuesday, 21 February, the space will also host a Daytime Carnival, with music from noon onwards.

So the Plaza de la Música confirms the position it has acquired as the city’s musical location par excellence in recent years, when it has been hosting events such as the Festival Cero indie music festival and the new Senior Festival, focusing on an older audience. Other concerts and events have made this square an ideal place for entertainment aimed at a range of audiences. It also serves as a unique vantage point from which to enjoy spectacular views of the entire course of Las Canteras Beach along the nearby extension of its walkway. It provides what is required at the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Carnival: a party very close to the beach.

2023 is a big year for the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Carnival. The most popular and most international of the city’s celebrations, with most participants, addresses the first full programme unhindered by the restrictions imposed by the Covid pandemic in the two previous years. The Carnival schedule, themed this year around the universe of the mythical New York nightclub Studio 54 and disco music, runs from February 10 to March 5. The greatest worldwide impact comes from the gala to be held on the last weekend: the great Drag Queen date. Platform shoes are one of the unmistakable identifying features of this great event as it livens up winter in the biggest city on the Canary Islands.

It is quite clear, from long before its scheduled events actually begin, that the Gran Canaria capital’s Carnival is much more than just a fiesta. Carnival activity spans practically the whole year with its production and preparation (including rehearsals for its Murgas and Comparsas and the work of those aspiring to the crowns), and this year the celebrations of the new edition started on February 4th, with the presentation of the candidates for its four main galas: the Junior Gala, the Grande Dame Gala, the classic Carnival Queen Gala, and the Drag Queen Gala.

From February 10, the Carnival will hold its main events in Santa Catalina Park, with the celebration of the main galas and competitions from the programme. Among these, the fancy-dress contest (February 11), the Grande Dame Gala (February 12), the Comparsa contest (February 17), the Murgas final (February 18, after three nights of prior heats), the Junior Gala (February 19), its prestigious International Body Painting Contest (February 21, Carnival Tuesday), the iconic Carnival Queen Gala (February 24) and even the well-established and popular Dog Carnival (February 26).

The Drag Queen Gala (broadcast internationally and a habitual Trending Topic worldwide on Twitter each year) will reach its 25th Anniversary on Friday March 3, on one of the most eagerly awaited nights of the festivities. Before, on February 20, a strongly contested preselection of finalists will take place, also at the Santa Catalina Park, with over twenty contenders giving their all to the live audience, but without the presence of cameras. The queens who get through this round thus keep the element of surprise for the big audiences on the night of the final. An evening where transgression and freedom are vindicated as its major values.

An additional and outstanding characteristic of the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Carnival is that it is a popular and urban celebration, reaching further than just its competitions. A Star Event is its Grand Parade, parading all around the centre of the city (March 4). Or the Burial of the Sardine (which rounds off the festivities on March 5). As well as this, Santa Catalina Park and the area surrounding the Plaza de la Música, next to the emblematic Alfredo Kraus Auditorium (at the west end of Las Canteras beach) will be the site for the Daytime Carnival celebrations, with great animation for the audience in fancy dress, and live music.  Concerts are also scheduled in that same Plaza de la Música on the Carnival Nights, with musical offerings to suit the different audiences and two stages: Disco Salsa and Urban Dance.

In its totality, the Carnival really is much more than a popular, social celebration: it is part of the very identity of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, an open and cosmopolitan city (permanently in contact with Europe, Africa and America since the end of the 19th century when the city’s Port assumed a strong position as a strategic Atlantic hub). This is what lies behind the significant investment made by the organisers, the Sociedad de Promoción de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (Society for the Promotion of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria), in the programme for these festivities. A total of between 3.5 and 4 million Euros. Altogether, profitability is ensured: the activity of the media and of the cultural sector, the businesses and catering activity in and around the zones of the celebrations, the impact on the hotel and rental trade and the production sectors linked to the festivities (from preparation of the fancy dress costumes to public transport) bring the economic impact of the Carnival to an estimated 20 million Euros, according to prior studies undertaken recently in collaboration with the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria.

2023 is a big year for the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Carnival. The most popular and most international of the city’s celebrations, with most participants, addresses the first full programme unhindered by the restrictions imposed by the Covid pandemic in the two previous years. The Carnival schedule, themed this year around the universe of the mythical New York nightclub Studio 54 and disco music, runs from February 10 to March 5. The greatest worldwide impact comes from the gala to be held on the last weekend: the great Drag Queen date. Platform shoes are one of the unmistakable identifying features of this great event as it livens up winter in the biggest city on the Canary Islands.

It is quite clear, from long before its scheduled events actually begin, that the Gran Canaria capital’s Carnival is much more than just a fiesta. Carnival activity spans practically the whole year with its production and preparation (including rehearsals for its Murgas and Comparsas and the work of those aspiring to the crowns), and this year the celebrations of the new edition started on February 4th, with the presentation of the candidates for its four main galas: the Junior Gala, the Grande Dame Gala, the classic Carnival Queen Gala, and the Drag Queen Gala.

From February 10, the Carnival will hold its main events in Santa Catalina Park, with the celebration of the main galas and competitions from the programme. Among these, the fancy-dress contest (February 11), the Grande Dame Gala (February 12), the Comparsa contest (February 17), the Murgas final (February 18, after three nights of prior heats), the Junior Gala (February 19), its prestigious International Body Painting Contest (February 21, Carnival Tuesday), the iconic Carnival Queen Gala (February 24) and even the well-established and popular Dog Carnival (February 26).

The Drag Queen Gala (broadcast internationally and a habitual Trending Topic worldwide on Twitter each year) will reach its 25th Anniversary on Friday March 3, on one of the most eagerly awaited nights of the festivities. Before, on February 20, a strongly contested preselection of finalists will take place, also at the Santa Catalina Park, with over twenty contenders giving their all to the live audience, but without the presence of cameras. The queens who get through this round thus keep the element of surprise for the big audiences on the night of the final. An evening where transgression and freedom are vindicated as its major values.

An additional and outstanding characteristic of the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Carnival is that it is a popular and urban celebration, reaching further than just its competitions. A Star Event is its Grand Parade, parading all around the centre of the city (March 4). Or the Burial of the Sardine (which rounds off the festivities on March 5). As well as this, Santa Catalina Park and the area surrounding the Plaza de la Música, next to the emblematic Alfredo Kraus Auditorium (at the west end of Las Canteras beach) will be the site for the Daytime Carnival celebrations, with great animation for the audience in fancy dress, and live music.  Concerts are also scheduled in that same Plaza de la Música on the Carnival Nights, with musical offerings to suit the different audiences and two stages: Disco Salsa and Urban Dance.

In its totality, the Carnival really is much more than a popular, social celebration: it is part of the very identity of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, an open and cosmopolitan city (permanently in contact with Europe, Africa and America since the end of the 19th century when the city’s Port assumed a strong position as a strategic Atlantic hub). This is what lies behind the significant investment made by the organisers, the Sociedad de Promoción de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (Society for the Promotion of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria), in the programme for these festivities. A total of between 3.5 and 4 million Euros. Altogether, profitability is ensured: the activity of the media and of the cultural sector, the businesses and catering activity in and around the zones of the celebrations, the impact on the hotel and rental trade and the production sectors linked to the festivities (from preparation of the fancy dress costumes to public transport) bring the economic impact of the Carnival to an estimated 20 million Euros, according to prior studies undertaken recently in collaboration with the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria.