The cultural life of Buenos Aires is incredibly rich. Although the city is most famous for its tango it also has good ballet, theatre, cinema, opera and classical music. There are many large cultural centres that offer a multitude of options, including free tango sessions, art exhibitions and concerts. A few good ones are: Centro Cultural Recoleta, Calle Junín 1930 (tel: (011) 4803 1040; website: www.centroculturalrecoleta.org), Centro Cultural General San Martín, Sarmiento 1551 (tel: (011) 4374 1251; website: www.ccgsm.gov.ar), or Centro Cultural Borges, Viamonte and San Martin (tel: (011) 5555 5359; website: www.ccborges.org.ar). Most concert halls and theatres are shut mid December to the end of February, when many porteños take their holidays.

The entertainment sections of newspapers The Buenos Aires Herald (website: www.buenosairesherald.com), Clarín (website: www.clarin.com) and La Nación (website: www.lanacion.com.ar/vialibre) list events, performances and screenings. The tourist office and kiosks can always supply the most up-to-date details about what's on. The Agenda section of Buenos Aires Day & Night magazine, available at tourist offices and cultural centres, has extensive entertainment listings. Bars, bookshops and hotels are also good sources of information along with flyers and posters at the city's cultural centres and museums.

You can buy tickets at the individual venues but there are also centralised ticket agencies (carteleras) in the centre, where music, theatre and cinema tickets can be obtained at discounted prices, for example Cartelera, Lavelle 835 (tel: (011) 4322 9263). Ticketek (tel: (011) 5237 7200; website: www.ticketek.com.ar) also sells advance tickets online and over the phone. It has a ticket booth at Alto Palermo Shopping on Santa Fe.

Music: Classical music is not as widely on offer as live music in bars, despite Argentina having world-class performers, such as soprano Maria Cristina Kiehr and tenor José Cura. The Teatro Colón, Avenida Libertad 621 (tel: (011) 4378 7344; website: www.teatrocolon.org.ar), is where the Buenos Aires Philharmonic plays and there are usually free classical music recitals held in the Salon Dorado (Gold Room). Opera, also performed by the Philharmonic, is of a high standard.

Theatre: Theatre is very popular, with a good mix of international and Argentine productions available to both locals and visitors. Argentine playwrights of merit include Roberto Arlt, Roberto Cosa and Griselda Gambaro. The season usually begins in March and local people are both enthusiastic and critical about the productions they attend. Complejo Teatral de Buenos Aires (tel: 0800 333 5254, information line, in Argentina only, or (011) 4371 0111; website: www.teatrosanmartin.com.ar), is a complex of five theatres, scattered throughout the city centre, which stage a varied programme of Argentine and international plays, as well as children's theatre. The Teatro del Pueblo, Avenida Roque Sáenz Peña 943 (tel: (011) 4326 3606; website: www.teatrodelpueblo.org.ar), stages modern and independent Argentine productions.

Dance: Argentine Julio Bocca is famous in the world of ballet but the general standard in the city is not that high. Top venues include the Teatro Colón (see Music above) and Teatro Coliseo, Calle Marcelo T de Alvear 1155 (call Ticketek for bookings). Tango is by far the dominant dance form and tango shows can be viewed in countless bars, cultural centres and even in the city streets. Salsa is also popular.

Film: Porteños are avid cinema-goers and Argentina has a strong film industry. Famous Argentine directors include Maria Luisa Bemberg, Alejandro Agresti, Fernando Solanas and Eliseo Subiela. Hollywood films are screened, as are arthouse films, while free films are often shown at cultural centres and museums. Big-screen pictures are shown in the original language with Spanish subtitles. The mainstream cinemas tend to be centred around Lavalle but multiplexes have sprung up around the city. The Galerias Pacifico, Calle Florida 753 (tel: (011) 5555 5357; website: www.galeriaspacifico.com.ar), and Village Recoleta, Vincente López and Calle Junín (tel: (011) 4800 0000; website: www.villagecines.com), are multi-screen cinemas showing popular films, while Cosmos, Avenida Corrientes 2046 (tel: (011) 4953 5405), is a good place to view an arthouse selection. Cinema listings can be found on www.pantalla.com.ar/cine.

Buenos Aires has been the setting for a number of films, most notably Alan Parker's Evita (1996), starring Madonna as Eva Perón. Also, the critically acclaimed and Oscar-nominated Nueve Reinas (Nine Queens) (2000), directed by Fabián Belinsky, tells the story of a group of small-time swindlers in Buenos Aires. More recently, The Motorcycle Diaries (2004), directed by Walter Salles, tracks Che Guevara's journey across South America starting in his home town of Buenos Aires.

Literary Notes: The city has inspired many writers, playwrights and poets, none more so than Jorge Luis Borges, known throughout the world for his poetry and short stories. His first book, following his return from Europe, Fervor de Buenos Aires (1923), is a collection of poems about the city, with references to La Recoleta Cemetery. His most famous short story, 'El Aleph', was based in the Constitucion area.

Ernesto Sabato wrote about the city's people and places in his psychological novel On Heroes and Tombs (1961). Buenos Aires resident Julio Cortazar focused on Argentinean characters in novels such as 62 (1968) and Hopscotch (1963), while novels by Manuel Puig, Betrayed by Rita Hayworth (1968) and Kiss of the Spiderwoman (1976), centre on the role of popular culture in Argentina. Tomas Eloy Martinez, in his books The Perón Novel (1985) and Santa Evita (1995), mixes fact about the lives of the Peróns with fiction.