The Devil's Dance of Tijarafeverified
Tijarafe's best-known act: a devil figure loaded with fireworks dances on the village square around midnight, accompanied by giants and big-heads and three orchestras.
The Devil's Dance is what makes many people know the name of Tijarafe at all. On the night of 7 September, on the village square, a devil figure loaded with fireworks comes out to dance among the crowd while the orchestras play. It is accompanied by giants and big-heads, and ends up consumed by its own gunpowder.
The fiesta programme itself tells the story: the Devil moved from its original date in May to 7 September in 1944, and grew along with the fiesta from then on. Primo Cruz described its early form as "a sack and two dozen rockets"; what you see today is on another scale entirely.
The verbena starts at 22:00 with the orchestras Nueva Línea, Frambuesa Tropicana's and Grupo Libertad.
There is more to the day before that: at 13:00 the 101 Brass Band walks the streets of El Pueblo, at 17:00 there is a rosary and at 17:30 a mass offered for the elderly and the sick, and at 19:00 a big bout of lucha canaria at the Terrero de Lucha Laureano Castro, a sport with a particularly deep following in Tijarafe.
It is a crowded event with pyrotechnics at close range: it is worth arriving early and picking your spot sensibly.