News & Blog

We begin on Sunday 20th September at Glasgow Royal Concert Hall with an unforgettable evening of music by Sir Karl Jenkins, with the composer himself conducting the Scottish Concert Orchestra. Featuring Jenkins’ iconic The Armed Man alongside excerpts from Palladio and Adiemus, the concert also welcomes three remarkable guest artists: mezzo-soprano Kathryn Rudge, hand percussionist Zands Duggan, and muezzin Osama Kiwan. A special opening to a special Season.

Verdi Requiem – 6 and 7 November Usher Hall, Edinburgh and Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

Our official RSNO Season opens with one of the great dramatic masterpieces of the choral repertoire – Verdi’s Requiem. An intoxicating blend of liturgy and grand opera, these performances will be conducted by the RSNO’s Principal Guest Conductor Patrick Hahn and feature a stellar quartet of soloists: Jennifer Davis, Deniz Uzun, Mario Lerchenberger and Edwin Crossley-Mercer. With the combined vocal forces of RSNO Chorus and the Edinburgh Festival Chorus, these performances promise to be an unforgettable experience for everyone fortunate enough to get a ticket.

Lord of the Rings Live – 6 December OVO Hydro, Glasgow

From the grandeur of Verdi to the spectacle of the Hydro. Lord of the Rings Live brings Howard Shore’s magnificent film scores to life in one of Europe’s largest indoor arenas. Widely regarded as among the greatest film music ever written, Shore’s score is a monumental symphonic achievement: an immense orchestral and choral work in which each of Tolkien’s cultures is given its own distinct musical identity, from the Celtic warmth of the Hobbits to the ethereal, Eastern-tinged writing for the Elves. The choral writing draws on Tolkien’s invented languages – Quenya, Sindarin and others – giving the voices an authenticity that goes far beyond atmospheric colour. Shore himself described his intention as making the music “feel old” – and the addition of voices to the symphonic writing adds an ethereal beauty that is inseparable from the emotional power of the films.

The last time we performed at the Hydro was December 2019, A Nightmare Before Christmas with Danny Elfman (Jack Skellington), Catherine O’Hara (Sally), and Ken Page (Oogie Boogie), stepping into their iconic roles. We feel sure Lord of the Rings will be equally memorable.

Christmas Concerts – 18 and 19 December Usher Hall, Edinburgh and Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

The festive season brings its own particular joys, and the RSNO Chorus Christmas Concerts have become a much-loved fixture in the festive calendar. This year the concerts welcome comedian and presenter Hugh Dennis as host, alongside the Chorus Academy Glasgow and Chorus Academy Dundee – a reminder that the RSNO’s choral family extends well beyond the main chorus itself. These are evenings of warmth, generosity and seasonal good cheer: the ideal moment to pause before the new year and simply enjoy the pleasure of singing together.

Handel’s Messiah – 2 January Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

Singing Messiah on the second day of the new year requires a particular kind of dedication. It also produces a particular kind of clarity – there is something about Handel’s writing that feels like a fresh start, a reorientation of the musical compass after the festivities. Conducting this year is Olivier Award-winner Peter Whelan, among the most dynamic and versatile exponents of historical performance of his generation. Dublin-born Whelan spent a decade as the SCO’s principal bassoonist before transitioning to the podium where he has become a conductor of exceptional authority in Baroque and Classical repertoire. As Artistic Director of the Irish Baroque Orchestra, his direction has been praised for its “rich insight, style and charisma.” He brings all of that intelligence and period-informed sensibility to Handel’s Messiah, alongside soloists Rachel Redmond, Helen Charlston, Anthony Gregory and Ashley Riches, and we are all eagerly anticipating this musical journey.

Carmina Burana – 12 and 23 March Usher Hall, Edinburgh and Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

If any work in the choral repertoire guarantees to thrill an audience, it is Carl Orff’s irresistible Carmina Burana. Visceral, rhythmically propulsive, and – in its famous opening and closing chorus – genuinely roof-raising, this is a piece that reminds us why people fall in love with choral music in the first place. Conducted by Sir James MacMillan, these concerts will also feature the composer’s own work, Timotheus, Bacchus and Cecilia, which receives its Scottish Premiere. Guardian critic, Martin Kettle, described MacMillan’s work as “a no-holds barred hymn to music” – a phrase that could equally be applied to Orff’s Carmina Burana! Soloists Caroline Wettergreen, Caspar Singh and Edward Nelson join forces with the RSNO Youth Chorus for what promises to be unforgettable evenings of music.

Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé – 16 and 17 April Usher Hall, Edinburgh and Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

Ravel’s choral writing in Daphnis et Chloé is unlike almost anything else in the repertoire. The chorus sings throughout without words – pure vocalise, voices treated not as a featured ensemble but as an extension of the orchestra itself, blending into Ravel’s luminous impressionistic textures as naturally as the wind and string sections. Much of the writing is delicate and atmospheric – soft sustained chords, floating hums that conjure pastoral landscapes and morning mist – but Ravel is also capable of turning those same voices into something rhythmically primal and viscerally powerful, as in the famous Danse guerrière.

Between those extremes lies some of the most sophisticated choral writing imaginable: dense divisi harmonies, extended chords built on major sevenths, ninths and whole-tone clusters that push a chorus to the very limits of its technical and tonal resources. Thomas Søndergård conducts, and we are hugely excited to bring this full with-chorus version to life.

Season Finale: Mahler Three – 21 and 22 May Usher Hall, Edinburgh and Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

The Season’s great summit. Mahler’s Third Symphony is one of the longest and most ambitious works in the orchestral canon – a vast, glowing extravaganza that moves from the raw energy of its enormous opening movement through some of the composer’s most tender and mysterious music to a finale of almost unbearable beauty. The chorus enters late in the symphony, joined by the RSNO Youth Chorus, with mezzo-soprano Beth Taylor as soloist. It is the kind of work that changes you slightly in the performing of it – that leaves you, at the final bar, wondering how music can express so much. Thomas Søndergård conducts again to close the Season with one of the towering achievements of western music.

Video Games Music in Concert – 3, 4 and 5 June Caird Hall, Dundee; Usher Hall, Edinburgh and Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

And then – just when you thought the Season was done – something completely different. Video Games Music in Concert brings the music of some of the most beloved games of recent decades to the concert hall, with conductor and arranger Òscar Senén leading the RSNO and Chorus through a programme that includes music from Final Fantasy 7, the Halo series, Skyrim and God of War. This is music that millions of people have grown up with – music that carries genuine emotional weight and deserves to be heard in a great concert hall with a full orchestra and chorus. It is also, if previous experiences of this repertoire are anything to go by, an awful lot of fun.