Vienna's accordion festival

Music lovers will be flocking to Austria in February when the annual international Accordion Festival gets underway in Vienna.

Held at various locations throughout the city, including the Porgy and Bess Jazz and Music Club and Planet Music, the event will feature hundreds of performers from around the world showcasing a wide range of musical styles from folk to punk.

Austrian band Attwenger and Dobrek Bistro and French-Austrian duo Otto Lechner and Arnaud Methivier will be some of the festival's main highlights.

The aim of the event is to bring accordion music to a wider audience and to demonstrate the instrument's versatility, proving that it is much more than just an accompaniment to folk songs.

The eighth international Accordion Festival in Vienna runs from February 25th to March 26th 2008 and British visitors can get there via cross-channel ferry to continental Europe.