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Vaughan Williams didn’t like to talk about the inspiration for his Fourth Symphony, and he didn’t need to, because the music speaks louder than any words. Raw, explosive and driven by unstoppable emotional force, this is music on the edge, written as Europe fell under the shadow of war. Not what you expected from Vaughan Williams? Well, Chief Conductor Ryan Wigglesworth loves to find unexpected connections and tell compelling musical stories. In a concert that begins with Mozart’s darkest and most dramatic piano concerto (with Wigglesworth directing from the keyboard, just as Mozart would have done) and includes the haunted beauty of Britten’s folksong suite, he’ll do just that.

Vaughan Williams didn’t like to talk about the inspiration for his Fourth Symphony, and he didn’t need to, because the music speaks louder than any words. Raw, explosive and driven by unstoppable emotional force, this is music on the edge, written as Europe fell under the shadow of war. Not what you expected from Vaughan Williams? Well, Chief Conductor Ryan Wigglesworth loves to find unexpected connections and tell compelling musical stories. In a concert that begins with Mozart’s darkest and most dramatic piano concerto (with Wigglesworth directing from the keyboard, just as Mozart would have done) and includes the haunted beauty of Britten’s folksong suite, he’ll do just that.

Vaughan Williams didn’t like to talk about the inspiration for his Fourth Symphony, and he didn’t need to, because the music speaks louder than any words. Raw, explosive and driven by unstoppable emotional force, this is music on the edge, written as Europe fell under the shadow of war. Not what you expected from Vaughan Williams? Well, Chief Conductor Ryan Wigglesworth loves to find unexpected connections and tell compelling musical stories. In a concert that begins with Mozart’s darkest and most dramatic piano concerto (with Wigglesworth directing from the keyboard, just as Mozart would have done) and includes the haunted beauty of Britten’s folksong suite, he’ll do just that.

"The remarkable soloist Ning Feng, his tone so sweet and pure, believed in every note, and as a result so did we” wrote The Times, after a performance of Brahms’s Violin Concerto by this phenomenal Chinese violinist – and after all, it takes a special kind of soloist to do justice to this noblest of the great Romantic violin concertos. This should be something special, and conductor Antony Hermus has devised a whole concert charged with wonder. Cinderella flees at midnight, and in Prokofiev’s shimmering ballet score, you’ll hear every chime, every magic spell, and every loving glance. Dutch composer Joey Roukens lights the touchpaper with a riotous nocturnal rollercoaster ride through a city of dreams.

All music tells a story, but the best music tells more than one. Shostakovich’s Festival Overture opens with jubilant trumpets – but this was the Soviet Union, so it would do, wouldn’t it? Prokofiev wrote his Sixth Symphony in the aftermath of World War Two, and though it’s certainly an epic, it’s far from clear that it ends in anything as simple as triumph. As you’d expect from Ilan Volkov, it’s the climax of a whole evening of music that asks as many questions as it answers, including Olga Neuwirth’s utterly original vision of a robot creator going terrifyingly off the rails. Armed with DJ turntables, a megaphone and clicking metal frogs, soloist Colin Currie - possibly the world’s greatest living percussionist – is the only man who can stop it…

All music tells a story, but the best music tells more than one. Shostakovich’s Festival Overture opens with jubilant trumpets – but this was the Soviet Union, so it would do, wouldn’t it? Prokofiev wrote his Sixth Symphony in the aftermath of World War Two, and though it’s certainly an epic, it’s far from clear that it ends in anything as simple as triumph. At the heart of this concert, Colin Currie performs a show-stopping Percussion Concerto by New York-based percussionist Andy Akiho. In Colin’s own words, he’s “completely blown away by the verve, joy, depth of emotion and vibrancy of colours” in this music, composed in 2019. Prepare for big-hearted marimba solos, chopsticks with amplified rice bowls (!) and a groovy ‘Grand Finale’.

When Sir James MacMillan speaks, the world takes notice – and at his Ayrshire community music festival, The Cumnock Tryst, he’s helping a generation of composers find their own individual voice. Tonight, he conducts the first Scottish performance of Ghosts, his new concerto for orchestra. Judging from that title (and knowing MacMillan’s passionate belief in the communicative power of music), there’s every reason to expect a lot more than just a colourful workout for a full symphony orchestra. MacMillan introduces it himself and also presents a dazzling, thought-provoking spread of new music from his younger colleagues at The Cumnock Tryst: a vibrant, typically generous celebration of the state of the art in Scottish classical music.

In 2002, a 12-year-old Jennifer Pike became the youngest-ever winner of the BBC Young Musician and in the two decades that followed has dazzled audiences across the globe. Tonight, she’ll bring her unique artistry to Mendelssohn’s uplifting Violin Concerto (a tried-and-tested audience favourite!).

Join us in the magnificent setting of Paisley Abbey for an epic choral masterpiece. Gerontius is a very ordinary sort of human being – and as he lies dying, he’s anguished and afraid. But his cry of longing opens a portal to wonders beyond the imagination. “This is the best of me” wrote Elgar on the score of The Dream of Gerontius, and this epic drama of a lonely soul’s voyage towards eternity can move listeners to tears. Ryan Wigglesworth has form with Elgar: in a previous performance, The Observer noted that he “plumbed the work’s rich meanings, sacred and secular” – and that Brenden Gunnell sang the title role “with feeling but never excess”. Beth Taylor, Neal Davies and the Huddersfield Choral Society complete an all-star line-up for this landmark of British music.

Here is your opportunity to experience Elgar’s epic choral masterpiece in the magnificent setting of the Usher Hall. Gerontius is a very ordinary sort of human being – and as he lies dying, he’s anguished and afraid. But his cry of longing opens a portal to wonders beyond the imagination. “This is the best of me” wrote Elgar on the score of The Dream of Gerontius, and this epic drama of a lonely soul’s voyage towards eternity can move listeners to tears. Ryan Wigglesworth has form with Elgar: in a previous performance, The Observer noted that he “plumbed the work’s rich meanings, sacred and secular” – and that Brenden Gunnell sang the title role “with feeling but never excess”. Beth Taylor, Neal Davies and the Huddersfield Choral Society complete an all-star line-up for this landmark of British music.