The Truth We Seek: Edinburgh International Festival 2025, Suor Angelica, La Clemenza di Tito, Mary Queen of Scots, Taverner's The Veil of the Temple & a focus on Poland

Nicola Benedetti (Photo: Laurence Winram)

The full programme for this year's Edinburgh International Festival has been released, the third festival under Nicola Benedetti's artistic directorship. This year celebrates the 60th anniversary of the Edinburgh Festival Chorus with performances of Vaughan Williams’s Sea Symphony, Bernstein’s Chichester Psalms, and Mendelssohn’s Elijah at the closing concert. The opening concert of the festival features the Edinburgh Festival Chorus alongside the Monteverdi Choir and the National Youth Choir of Scotland in a rare complete performance of John Tavener's The Veil of the Temple, which will only be the second time the work has been performed complete in the UK.

In celebration of the UK/Poland 2025 season, NFM Leopoldinum Orchestra will be one of the festival's resident orchestras, and there will be Wrocław Baroque Ensemble, VOŁOSI, Piotr Anderszewski, Bomsori Kim to 2024’s BBC Young Musician of the Year, Ryan Wang.

Opera Queensland bring their staging of Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice with Iestyn Davies and Samantha Clarke, in a staging that brings together acrobatics and video projections, with Australian contemporary circus company Circa joining with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and a chorus from Scottish Opera. A cross-genre stage work, Book of Mountains and Seas fuses opera with puppetry, composed by Huang Ruo, one of the most exciting figures of contemporary opera, with the Danish choir Ars Nova Copenhagen, joined by an ensemble of percussionists and puppeteers. 

Antonio Pappano and the London Symphony Orchestra are resident at the festival, giving three concerts including a concert performance of Puccini's Suor Angelica. Maxim Emelyanychev and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra continue their exploration of Mozart operas with La Clemenza di Tito and a cast including Tara Erraught and Angela Brower.

Also resident at the festival will be Carnegie Hall’s National Youth Orchestra 2, and other visitors include the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, the Budapest Festival Orchestra, and the NCPA Orchestra from Beijing. Aurora Orchestra makes its International Festival debut with Shostakovich's Fifth Symphony, in the 50th anniversary of the composer's death. The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment will be combining hip hop with Bach in Breaking Bach with choreographer Kim Brandstrup.

Scottish Ballet will be presenting a new full-length dance work from choreographer Sophie Laplane and director James Bonas, Mary, Queen of Scots will feature music by Mikael Karlsson & Michael P Atkinson performed by the Scottish Ballet Orchestra. The Scottish premiere of Figures in Extinction sees Nederlands Dans Theater in collaborating with choreographer Crystal Pite and theatremaker Simon McBurney.

Over 50,000 tickets (more than half of all tickets available for the 2025 International Festival) are priced at £30 or under. Thousands of free tickets are available for young musicians, NHS staff and community groups, and £10 Affordable Tickets are available for all performances for anyone who needs them. 

This year, for the first time, a Dementia-Friendly concert will be presented for people living with dementia, their caregivers, family and friends. The wider 2025 programme features 33 accessible performances, including nine audio described performances, seven BSL interpreted performances, thirteen captioned performances and four relaxed performances.

Full details from the festival's website. 

Edinburgh International Festival celebrates its 75th anniversary with 35,000 free tickets

Ukraine Freedom Orchestra © 2022 

Edinburgh International Festival is 75 and to celebrate it is giving out 35,0000 free tickets to four large-scale events, including circus and physical theatre, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Ukraine Freedom Orchestra and an immersive light and sound experience.

The festival opens with Macro at BT Murrayfield, presented as part of the UK/Australia Season 2021-22, Macro features circus and physical theatre company Gravity & Other Myths, First Nations dance company Djuki Mala, the National Youth Choir of Scotland and Scottish musicians including Aidan O’Rourke, Brìghde Chaimbeul, Lauren MacColl and Kathleen MacInnes.

The Philadelphia Orchestra, led by conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin, (in residence at the festival) present Thank You, Edinburgh – a free concert given as a big thank you to the city and residents of Edinburgh at the Edinburgh Playhouse on Saturday 27 August at 3pm and it will also be relayed live to the Ross Bandstand in Princes Street Gardens. 

Dreamachine, part of UNBOXED: Creativity in the UK, is a free immersive experience at Murrayfield Ice Rink using light and sound to explore the potential of the human mind. Created by Collective Act, presented by Edinburgh Science, and bringing together Turner Prize-winning artists Assemble, Grammy and Mercury nominated musician and composer Jon Hopkins, and a team of leading technologists, scientists and philosophers. 

The festival and the Scottish Government are partnering to welcome the Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra for a free concert at the Usher Hall on Saturday 6 August 2pm. The orchestra includes recent refugees, Ukrainian members of European orchestras and leading Ukrainian musicians and performers including soprano Liudmyla Monastyrska and pianist Anna Fedorova. Led by Canadian-Ukrainian conductor Keri-Lynn Wilson, the special concert sees invitations extended to the Ukrainian community in Scotland and organisations leading efforts in the resettlement of Ukrainian refugees.

Full details from the festival website.

The 2022 Edinburgh International Festival celebrates the festival's 75th birthday, the final programme by artistic director Fergus Linehan and a return to a full programme in indoor spaces

Edinburgh Festival Theatre (Photo Wikimedia)

The final concert of the 2019 Edinburgh International Festival was a performance of Wagner's Gotterdammerung. It could not have been more apt. The 2020 festival did not happen, and 2021 was in somewhat reduced format with the majority of events taking place in semi-outdoor spaces. This year, the festival's 75th anniversary year and Fergus Linehan's final year as artistic director (next year the Scottish violinist Nicola Benedetti takes over the role), things are back to normal with a full programme of events in indoor spaces. There is no overall theme, except perhaps one of joy and celebration and as if to emphasise that change from last year, the opening concert will feature 300 people on the stage of the Usher Hall. I spoke to Andrew Moore, the festival's Head of Music to find out more about what will be on offer.

Whilst the festival's venues this year return to normal, with the Festival Theatre, the Usher Hall and the Queen's Hall featuring heavily, they do not rule out bringing back one of the 2021 special venues for particular projects as they are able to fulfil a role that the regular festival venues cannot. 

For this year, the festival is trialling large-scale residencies, having visiting groups for longer rather than simply flying in and out. This was something that happened in the past, and has two advantages. In terms of climate responsibility, having visitors coming for longer makes sense, and in artistic terms there is the possibility of engaging more deeply with audiences. In 2017, the Teatro Regio Torino came for ten days which was a very special event. So this year, two orchestras will be having residencies, the Philharmonia Orchestra and the Philadelphia Orchestra.

High ambitions: Edinburgh International Festival's classical music programme for 2021

Jenna Reid (fiddle), Su-a Lee (cello) and Iain Sandilands (percussion) perform in the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh to celebrate the launch of the 2021 Edinburgh International Festival programme (Photo Ryan Buchanan)

How do you plan a festival when even the idea of a concert is uncertain? The Edinburgh International Festival has announced its plans for the Summer festival running from 7 to 29 August 2021. I spoke last week to Andrew Moore, the festival's Head of Music, about the festival's classical music programme for 2021 and he admits that the planning process has been a rollercoaster, going through various phases of planning over the Winter. However, despite the limits and restrictions, this year's festival features over 170 classical and contemporary music, theatre, opera, dance and spoken word performance, including 15 new commissions and premieres.

Early last year, there was hope that we might be back inside for concerts in Autumn 2020 but then reality dawned. The festival's director Fergus Linehan proposed the idea of outdoor performances for 2021. In September 2020 it seemed cautious indeed to consider we would not be back indoors until Autumn 2021, but now Linehan's ideas seem prescient. So the festival's classical music programme for 2021 will be taking place largely in the festival's new indoor/outdoor pavilions (at Old College Quad, Edinburgh Park and Edinburgh Academy Junior School).

In terms of programming, Andrew says that it has been a challenge but exciting as they had to unpick a lot of last year's cancelled programme, do some shuffling and re-work the original plans for 2021. The negotiating with artists about dates and programmes felt more like a normal year, but the repertoire had to be looked at from a different perspective. Social distancing on stage means that they had to consider smaller numbers of musicians, with no significant chorus (a maximum of 12), an orchestra of 45 maximum, and works with no interval. But for all the restrictions, Andrew says their ambition was high. 

Edinburgh innovations: the 2021 festival will involve three new temporary outdoor pavilions and streamed performances

Edinburgh University Old College Quad

Like most other Summer festivals, the Edinburgh International Festival was cancelled last year, but for 2021 the festival is taking steps to ensure that some sort of live performance will be possible. The festival is planned for 7 to 29 August 2021, and they are creating three bespoke outdoor venues which will enable artists and audience to gather safely. The three temporary pavillions, designed especially for live performance, will be at what are described as iconic locations in the city including Edinburgh Park and the University of Edinburgh's Old College Quad.

My memories of Edinburgh Summers is not one of unalloyed joy when it comes to weather, so I trust that the designers have taken Scottish weather into account!

As the element of international travel in the audience this year is likely to be far smaller than usual, the festival is also planning to go digital and release a selection of high-quality streamed performances free of charge during each week of the Festival, for audiences in Edinburgh and around the world to enjoy from home.

An artist impression of the University of Edinburgh's Old College Quad with the temporary outdoor pavilion during the 2021 Edinburgh International Festival.

The full programme for the festival will be announced on 2 June 2021. Full details from the festival website.

Dvořák's Requiem in Edinburgh, and a UK debut

Jakub Hrůša & Bamberg Symphony Orchestra (Photo Andreas Herzau Klein)

Antonín Dvořák had quite a strong connection with the UK performing quite a number of works here himself and his music was popular, particularly the large scale choral works. His oratorio Saint Ludmilla  was written for the Leeds Festival in 1886, whilst his Requiem was premiered in Birmingham in October 1891, both with the composer conducting. There is a rare chance to hear the Requiem at the Edinburgh International Festival on Tuesday 21 August 2018 when Jakub Hrůša conducts the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra.

Jakub Hrůša, who has been conducting Samuel Barber's Vanessa at Glyndebourne [see my review], has been the chief conductor of the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra since 2016/17, the orchestra's 70th anniversary season. The performance at the Edinburgh Festival represents the orchestra's UK debut. The orchestra has interesting Czech roots, as it was originally based on musicians who were in the German Philharmonic Orchestra Prague.

For the performance of the Requiem, Hrůša and the orchestra will be joined by the Edinburgh Festival Chorus and soloists Eva Hornyaková (Soprano), Václava Krejčí Housková (Mezzo-soprano), Pavel Černoch (Tenor) and Jan Martinik (Bass). Full details from the Edinburgh International Festival website.

Anne-Sophie Mutter portrait

Anne-Sophie Mutter and the Mutter Virtuosi

In another of the Edinburgh International Festival Portraits on YouTube, violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter talks about music as a social tool, musicians are there to share music with the audience irrespective of cultural heritage and religious beliefs and she feels that music reminds us that we have a soul. Again the portrait lasts just under 5 minutes and is simply Anne-Sophie Mutter talking to camera, and much that she has to say is absorbing and it includes comments on acoustics and helping the audience tune in. You can see the video after the break.

Anne-Sophie Mutter will be performing Vivaldi's Four Seasons at the Usher Hall on 26 August 2015, with her own group, the Mutter Virtuosi, also performing Bach's Concerto for Two Violins and the world premiere of Andre Previn's Nonet (Further information of the festival website).

Nicola Benedetti portrait

Nicola Benedetti

The Edinburgh International Festival is gearing up for this year's festival by releasing a series of artist portraits on YouTube. Scottish violinist Nicola Benedetti will be performing Glazunov's Violin Concerto with Vasily Petrenko and the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra at the Usher Hall on 16 August 2015, in a programme which also includes music by the Norwegian composer Geirr Tveitt (1908-1981) and Sibelius's Symphony no. 1 (further information from the festival website).

To complement this, they have issued a Festival Portrait in which Nicola Benedetti talks about her vulnerabilities on stage stage, and artists embracing idiosyncrasy on stage. It lasts 5 minutes, and there is no padding, just Nicola Benedetti talking directly to camera in a rather endearingly candid portrait. You can see it after the break.