Tamborrada 2027 in San Sebastián: flag raising and Saint Sebastian's Day

Twenty-four hours of drumming

The Tamborrada is San Sebastián's great festival and it lasts exactly one day. It begins at midnight on 20 January — that is, on the night of the 19th — with the raising of the city flag in the Plaza de la Constitución by the Gaztelubide society, and ends twenty-four hours later, when the Unión Artesana tamborrada lowers that same flag at midnight.

Between those two moments the city does not stop. Companies of drums and barrels work their way through the neighbourhoods in shifts, day and night, and what every one of them plays is the March of San Sebastián by Raimundo Sarriegui, composed in the 19th century. Learn it before you come and you will understand half the festival.

Why they are dressed as cooks

The companies parade dressed as cooks and as Napoleonic soldiers. The story told in the city is that the festival grew out of a parody: locals imitating the marching step of the troops who occupied San Sebastián in the early 19th century, banging on water barrels instead of drums. Hence the apron, the hat and the mockery.

The midnight flag raising has been held since 1926, which made the 2026 edition the centenary.

The children's tamborrada

The morning of 20 January belongs to the children. Around eight thousand schoolchildren parade through the centre with their own drums and barrels, in companies organised by school, wearing the same cook's uniform in miniature. For anyone living here with kids it is the day of the school year; for a visitor it is probably the loveliest part of the festival and the least overwhelming.

Where to stand (the important part)

• The Plaza de la Constitución is full hours before midnight. If you do not arrive by about 10pm you will not see the flag raising: you will see the backs of other people's heads. Plenty of locals watch it from the surrounding bars or on local television, and that is no defeat.
• The festival is not only in the square. Companies pass through the whole city for twenty-four hours. Planting yourself on a corner of the old town or the centre and waiting works better than chasing the square.
• It is a January night on the Cantabrian coast. It is cold and it usually rains. Wear waterproofs rather than carrying an umbrella: in that crush an umbrella is a liability.
• 20 January is a local public holiday in San Sebastián, but only there. If you work outside the city, plan for it.
• Book accommodation well in advance if you do not live here. Along with the film festival, it is the tightest night of the year for finding a bed.

And in other towns

San Sebastián has no monopoly: Azpeitia holds its own tamborrada, and there are more across Gipuzkoa and Navarre. Official sources usually publish the programme in January; as soon as it appears, the individual events will show at the top of this page.