Edinburgh Festival '99: Pick of the Day - The five must-see shows

Farces

Assembly Rooms, Venue 3, 4.45pm, pounds 8.00

Russians on stilts totter tantalisingly through a comedy of intensely

lyrical beauty.

The Nualas in `The

Big Shiny Dress Tour'

Assembly Ballroom, Venue 3, 6.50pm, pounds 8.50

Sequin chic and bone-dry wit from the Irish trio. Sure to be a sell-out.

Huun Huur Tu: Throat Singers of Tuvan

Greyfriars Kirk, Venue 131, 11.45pm, pounds 10.00

Mystical, meditative over-tone humming: you'll find it hard to believe that the human voice can produce such a glorious noise.

Vic Henley

The Wildman Room, Assembly Rooms, Venue 3, 8.45pm, pounds 9.00

Alabama-born Vic Henley does for rednecks what ketchup does for sausages: manages to make them both delicious and digestible.

David Strassman

Pleasance One, Venue 33, 10pm, pounds 9.50

Ventriloquist David Strassman gives a show that's just too scary for puppets. Not one for the faint of heart...