Concert Season 2025 - 2026
With Thanks to our Sponsors
Conductor - Neil Mantle MBE
Note: All evening concerts commence at 7:30pm
in St Cuthbert's Church, Lothian Road
Tickets for all concerts are available for online booking from CultureEdinburgh.com, or by telephone (0131 228 1155) and in person from the Usher Hall Box Office.
Sunday 3rd May 2026 at 7:30pm
Berlioz, Debussy, Faure and Saint-Saëns
Berlioz: Overture: Le Carnaval Romain
Fauré: Incidental Music: ‘Caligula’
with Linlithgow Ladies Choir, director Kirsty Ball
Debussy: Dances - Danse sacrée et Danse profane
soloist: Helen Thompson (harp)
Saint-Saëns: Symphony No. 3 ‘Organ Symphony’
We conclude this, our 55th season, with a French evening. The concert opens with Berlioz’s most brightly coloured overture: The Roman Carnival. The pace then relaxes to provide you with an opportunity to hear little-known works by Fauré and Debussy. For the latter, we feature our principal harpist, Helen Thompson, in this hypnotic and typically sensual work. The crowning glory concluding this performance, and bringing our season to a roof-raising conclusion, is Saint-Saëns' thrilling Organ Symphony. St. Cuthbert’s boasts a magnificent four-manual JW Walker organ which has the necessary power and range to counterbalance and even compete with the large orchestral forces in this epic work. We look forward greatly to welcoming you—either as a long standing loyal patron or as a new audience member—to join us in our exciting series of live performances!
Tickets, price price £17.00 (concessions: £15.00; Student: £8.00; accompanied schoolchildren: free), are available now from CultureEdinburgh at the Usher Hall Box Office.
Concert Season 2026–2027: Advance Information
Booking information will be advised when available. Meanwhile, please save the dates!
Sunday 30th August 2026 at 7:30pm
Swan Lake
Prokofiev: Symphony No. 4
Tchaikovsky: Swan Lake (Ballet Suite)
Rachmaninoff: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini
soloist: Maya Irgalina (piano)
A warm welcome to our 2026–2027 season of concerts, whether you are one of our long term supporters
or a new visitor to our website!
We open our 56th season with an exciting all Russian programme, highlighting Rachmaninoff’s ever popular “Rhapsody on a Theme of
Paganini”, in which we are joined by virtuoso pianist Maya Irgalina, who is making her first appearance with us. Maya (who was awarded a
gold medal for performance at the RNCM) is a Britten-Pears Young Artist, and has performed at both the Wigmore Hall and for BBC Radio 3.
The music of Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake is, of course, known and loved the world over; and to complete our programme, we offer a
rare opportunity to experience the excitement of Prokofiev’s 4th symphony live!
Sunday 22nd November 2026 at 7:30pm
Bruch Violin Concerto
Dyson: Overture to "The Canterbury Pilgrims"
Delius: Brigg Fair
Bruch: Violin Concerto No 1 in G minor
soloist: Ruth Rogers
Brahms: Symphony No. 4 in E minor
One of the best loved of all works for violin, and a Classic FM favourite, the concerto by Max Bruch is the
centrepiece of our November programme, in which we are delighted to welcome Ruth Rogers as our soloist. Ruth, a previous
co-leader of The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, is now Leader and Director of The London Mozart Players.
The Fourth Symphony of Brahms — the last work he composed in this genre — is undoubtedly his greatest and most powerful.
We have always championed the music of our native shores, and with this in mind, we feature two delightful and engaging works by
Frederick Delius and George Dyson to act as the perfect counterbalance to the more serious atmosphere of the Brahms symphony.
Sunday 7th February 2027 at 7:30pm
An Alpine Symphony
Vaughan Williams: Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis
Strauss: Four Last Songs
soloist: Jessica Leary (soprano)
Strauss: An Alpine Symphony
‘Finally, I have learnt how to orchestrate’ was Strauss’s perhaps rather surprising comment upon hearing his
Alpine Symphony for the first time. It is the largest in scale and the last of his nine tone poems, requiring well over one
hundred performers to realise its immense demands. Sinfonia will be at its fullest dimensions, including no fewer than twenty horns,
wind machine, thunder machine and organ. This is a rare opportunity to experience this wonderful work live, and one definitely not to be missed!
Continuing the Strauss theme, we welcome Scottish soprano Jessica Leary to join us in performing his final opus, the Four Last Songs.
Another ‘Classic FM Hall of Fame’ firm favourite — currently fourth on their list of two hundred — is Vaughan Williams’s
beautiful “Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis”, a work which did much to establish his international reputation.
Sunday 9th May 2027 at 7:30pm
Mahler One
Mendelssohn: Overture to "Athalia"
Korngold: Violin Concerto
soloist: Madeleine Mitchell
Mahler: Symphony No 1 in D major
We bring our season to a truly triumphal conclusion with the music of Gustav Mahler. His music has been firmly
embedded in Sinfonia’s DNA since our first performance of this very symphony in 1972. Since then we have given nearly fifty
performances of his nine completed symphonies — most recently in our highly acclaimed Edinburgh Festival account of the Ninth
in 2024.
Our soloist in the beautiful Violin Concerto by Korngold, Madeleine Mitchell, has performed in more than forty countries, including
the Czech Republic, Germany, Poland, and Russia. At home, Madeleine has appeared with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, the Royal
Philharmonic Orchestra, and at the BBC Proms.
We’re sure you will agree there is something for everyone in our forthcoming season and we much look forward to welcoming you to our
exciting series of concerts!
Future dates and programme details will be announced here as they become available.
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