For the love of music
ST ANDREWS 25/26
“If you reach one person in the audience, that makes years of work worth it”
WATCH MAX'S INTERVIEW
Max Mandel
PRINCIPAL VIOLA
Photo: Christopher Bowen
Welcome to the Scottish Chamber Orchestra’s 2025/26 Season
Photo: Christopher Bowen
Haydn’s Drum Roll
STRAUSS
Suite in B-flat Op.4
HARTMANN
Concerto funèbre
HAYDN
Symphony No.103 in E-flat
‘Drum Roll’
Alina Ibragimova violin/director
Violinist Alina Ibragimova leads us from grief and fear to radiant joy in her deeply emotional concert with the SCO. Ibragimova is among today’s most compelling, perceptive soloists, combining a penetrating musical intellect with gripping, passionate playing – qualities very much on display in her intensely expressive programme.
Haydn composed his ‘Drum Roll’ Symphony expressly to impress, inspire and delight – and more than two centuries later, it still does all three. The sunny, colourful B-flat Suite was the piece that kick-started the 20-year-old Richard Strauss’ musical career, and its music feels just as fresh and appealing today.
Ibragimova’s concert centrepiece is a concerto she has long championed. Written during the dark first days of the Second World War, Karl Amadeus Hartmann’s Concerto funèbre draws on influences from Bruckner and Mahler in music of deep compassion, sadness and visionary hope.
Wed 22 Oct, 7.30pm
Holy Trinity Church, St Andrews
Tickets £15 – £26
Photo: Eva Vermandel
Carmina Gadelica Matinee
SCO & RCS Winds
Side by Side
MOZART arr CEBRIÁN
Music from The Marriage of Figaro
MACMILLAN
Untold
CAPPERAULD
Carmina Gadelica
DOVE
Figures in the Garden
MOZART
Sextet in B-flat KV270
MENDELSSOHN arr CEBRIÁN
Music from A Midsummer Night’s Dream
SCO Wind Soloists
RCS Wind Soloists
The SCO’s internationally renowned Wind Soloists join forces with some of Scotland’s most accomplished young players for a kaleidoscopic concert of wit and wild imagination – with Mozart rediscovered amid some distinctively Scottish landscapes.
SCO Principal Flute André Cebrián follows in a centuries-old tradition in reworking music from Mozart’s sparkling operas for the velvety richness of a wind ensemble, while Jonathan Dove imagines The Marriage of Figaro taking place among the blooms and bushes of a very English garden.
By way of contrast, Sir James MacMillan explores an Irish love song in his early, rarely heard Untold, while SCO Associate Composer Jay Capperauld takes inspiration from Gaelic hymns, incantations and songs in his striking new wind dectet, Carmina Gadelica.
Sat 22 Nov, 3pm
Holy Trinity Church, St Andrews
Tickets £15 – £26
In partnership with
Mozart Matinee with Peter Whelan
MOZART
Serenade KV 320 ‘Posthorn’, interspersed with arias from Mitridate, La clemenza di Tito, Così fan tutte and The marriage of Figaro.
MOZART
Overture, Der Schauspieldirektor
Peter Whelan
conductor/fortepiano
Tara Erraught mezzo soprano
Maximiliano Martín clarinet
Peter Franks posthorn
From a big-hearted Serenade to uplifting opera arias – celebrate the full breadth of Mozart’s musical glories at this sumptuous concert in the company of some passionate Mozartians.
Peter Whelan is one of Europe’s most exciting interpreters of Baroque and Classical repertoire –formerly the SCO’s Principal Bassoon, he’s now Artistic Director of the Irish Baroque Orchestra. He intersperses the movements of Mozart’s festive ‘Posthorn’ Serenade – which wittily incorporates the distinctive sounds of the mail-coach trumpet – with vibrant arias from some of the composer’s most adored operas, sung by acclaimed Irish mezzo soprano Tara Erraught.
From strong emotions to effervescent fun, experience all the musical mastery of Mozart.
Wed 17 Dec, 2pm
Holy Trinity Church, St Andrews
Tickets £15 – £26
Photo: Marco Borggreve
Saxophone Dreams with Jess Gillam
ANNA CLYNE
Sound and Fury †
DANI HOWARD
Saxophone Concerto*
GEORGE WALKER
Lyric for Strings
CAROLINE SHAW
Entr’acte
DAVE HEATH
The Celtic*
JOHN HARLE Rant!*
Ben Glassberg conductor
Jess Gillam saxophones*
An inspiring fixture on radio and TV, Cumbrian-born Jess Gillam is first and foremost a world-class saxophonist. She brings her invigorating musical personality to a typically adventurous collection of music across diverse styles and sounds.
Young British composer Dani Howard wrote her effervescent new Saxophone Concerto specially for Gillam, while Dave Heath throws you into the whirling energy of a raucous ceilidh in his galvanising concerto The Celtic.
Haydn provides the calmer inspiration for Anna Clyne’s scintillating Sound and Fury, written for the SCO in 2019, and also for Caroline Shaw’s mercurial Entr’acte. The great African American composer George Walker, meanwhile, regularly moves listeners to tears with his striking Lyric for Strings.
†Commissioned by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra
Wed 11 Mar, 7.30pm
Holy Trinity Church, St Andrews
Tickets £15 – £26
Photo: Robin Clewley
Baroque Threads, Contemporary Colours
COUPERIN arr ADÈS
Les barricades mystérieuses
VAUGHAN WILLIAMS
Suite for Viola and Small Orchestra (Selection)
TIPPETT
Fantasia on a Theme of Corelli
RAMEAU
Les Sauvages
LINDBERG
Viola Concerto (Scottish Premiere)
Lawrence Power director/viola
Kaleidoscopic hues and big emotions sit side by side in this vibrant concert weaving together the Baroque era and the present day, directed by outstanding British viola player Lawrence Power.
After two catchy tunes by Baroque masters Couperin and Rameau – the first in a witty arrangement by contemporary British composer Thomas Adès –Tippett spins visionary tendrils of sound in his rapturous Corelli-inspired Fantasia, while Vaughan Williams saved some of his most memorably melodic music for his rarely-heard Suite.
Power himself is the dedicatee of the Viola Concerto by Finnish powerhouse composer Magnus Lindberg: expect scintillating soundscapes and perfumed harmonies in this deeply charismatic music.
Wed 22 Apr, 7.30pm
Holy Trinity Church, St Andrews
Photo: Jack Liebeck
The Musical World of Jay Capperauld Digital Season 2025/26
Wherever you are in the world, experience the joy and passion of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra in three thrilling performances, captured in a trio of specially commissioned films recorded in Edinburgh’s atmospheric Leith Theatre. Get up close to the SCO’s exceptional musicians as they perform three enthralling pieces by SCO Associate Composer, Jay Capperauld.
Hailed as one of Scotland’s most distinctive and original musical voices, Capperauld creates works that teem with energy and ideas, with profound emotions and mischievous wit. His music sets out to challenge and provoke – sometimes posing fundamental questions about life and death – but also to inspire and entertain.
Experience three new Scottish masterpieces conceived and created specifically for the Orchestra, in definitive performances from the SCO and Principal Conductor Maxim Emelyanychev, and the SCO Chorus and Chorus Director Gregory Batsleer.
Join the SCO’s global community to watch live as each film is premiered online, or catch up for a whole year after the first broadcast date.
Free to view
Co-presented by
Photo: Euan Robertson
The Origin of Colour
Thu 16 Oct, 7.30pm
Capperauld’s kaleidoscopic, Calvino-inspired orchestral showpiece launched the SCO’s 50th Anniversary Season in style, imagining the first colours illuminating an otherwise monochrome world in music of vibrant energy and iridescent hues. Discover (or rediscover) this dazzling, delightful music in a thrilling performance by the SCO and Maxim Emelyanychev.
Supported by
Bruckner’s Skull
Thu 12 Feb, 7.30pm
From the multicoloured to the macabre: Capperauld’s murky creation was inspired by the life-and-death obsessions of Austrian composer Anton Bruckner, who reputedly kissed the exhumed skulls of Beethoven and Schubert when the composers’ remains were transferred between Viennese cemeteries. Premiered last Season to enormous acclaim, this audacious creation dares to stare death directly in the face – experience its uncanny power in this performance from the SCO and Maxim Emelyanychev.
Supported by the Fidelio Charitable Trust and the Marchus Trust
The Night Watch
Thu 2 Apr, 7.30pm
Capperauld’s tender choral work is a meditation on parenthood and the love between father and child, a joyful, intimate setting of a poem by Scottish writer Niall Campbell. Immerse yourself in its jazz-inflected harmonies and radiant wonder in a performance by the SCO Chorus and Chorus Director Gregory Batsleer.
Tickets and how to book
Season Multibuy Packages available from 14 April 2025, 10am.
Book for a minimum of four eligible concerts across any Edinburgh, Glasgow, or St Andrews concerts to be eligible for Multibuy Package discounts. Visit www.sco.org.uk for full listings.
Please note that seating is unreserved within each price band.
Book online: www.sco.org.uk/multibuy By Phone: 0131 557 6800 (Mon-Fri, 10am-4pm)
By Post: Send a completed booking form to us at SCO Tickets, 4 Royal Terrace, Edinburgh, EH75AB
Booking Individual Concerts (via The Byre Theatre) From 19 May, 10am
If you wish to book 1, 2, or 3 concerts in the 2025/26 St Andrews Season you can do so via The Byre Theatre box office. Visit www.byrethreatre.com or call 01334 475 000 or drop into the Byre Theatre box office in person to book your tickets.
Discounts
18 and under*
Anyone under the age of 18 can attend most SCO concerts for free. Under 16s must, however, be accompanied by a paying adult. Free Under 18 tickets are not available for The Great Grumpy Gaboon and Dementia-friendly concerts.
19-26 year olds, full-time students and people in receipt of Universal Credit* £6 for all concerts except The Great Grumpy Gaboon and Dementia-friendly concerts.
People with a disability*
50% off full price tickets for people registered disabled. Essential carer tickets are free of charge.
Group booking discounts
Groups of six or more booking together save 20% off full price tickets. Groups of 20 can also claim one complimentary ticket for the group organiser. Available from Monday 19 May, from the venue box offices. Group discounts are not available for The Great Grumpy Gaboon and Dementia-friendly concerts.
School Group bookings
Free tickets for school groups are available for selected concerts. For details on availability and how to book, visit sco.org.uk/schools-go-free or email boxoffice@sco.org.uk
*Proof of eligibility may be required.
Booking fees and refund policy
A booking fee of £2 is applicable to all Multibuy package bookings made via the SCO. Booking fees vary via venues. All discounts are subject to availability. We regret that tickets are non-refundable.
Every effort is made to ensure that all information is correct at the time of going to print. The SCO reserves the right to change dates, artists or programmes if necessary.
SCO Donors and current ticket buyers receive regular news by email and post. More information on how we process data can be found within the Privacy Statement on our website, at sco.org.uk/privacy-statement
Group and school bookings must be confirmed no later than four weeks before the concert date.
“For me I want to tell a story, communicate, move people and make them feel things”
WATCH KATHERINE’S INTERVIEW
Katherine Bryer
SUB-PRINCIPAL OBOE
Photo: Christopher Bowen
4 Royal Terrace
Edinburgh EH7 5AB
+44 (0)131 557 6800 sco.org.uk
The Scottish Chamber Orchestra is a charity registered in Scotland No. SC015039. Company registration No. SC075079
Every effort is made to ensure that all information is correct at the time of going to print. The SCO reserves the right to change dates, artists or programmes if necessary.