Top Classical Artists (and 100 Tubas) Lined Up for Lammermuir Festival 2026

The Lammermuir Festival returns to the historic churches of East Lothian this September (8th to 20th) with a varied programme of classical music by world-class musicians, many of whom will be familiar to festival audiences from  previous years.

Pianist Jeremy Denk, a defining presence at Lammermuir in recent years, leads a three concert Mozart piano concerto series with Royal Northern Sinfonia directed by Maria Włoszczowska charting the composer’s emotional and technical mastery.

This style of sustained musical conversation over multiple events has become a hallmark of the Lammermuir Festival, offering audiences the chance to follow musical ideas as they develop.

Royal Northern Sinfonia and its chorus also bring their first concert performance of a Mozart opera, Così fan tutteto Lammermuir in the hands of their dynamic conductor Dinis Sousa and with a fantastic line-up of soloists including Christina Gansch and Alexandra Oomens.

Haydn

Alongside the Mozart cycle and opera sits a major Haydn focus from leading period ensemble Concerto Copenhagen. Their residency includes a sequence of programmes exploring Haydn’s symphonic world, including the vivid triptych of the ‘Morning, Noon and Night’ symphonies – works that capture a young composer testing the limits of orchestral colour and imagination.

Elsewhere, cycles and sequences shape the listening experience: from Schubert’s Winterreise – performed by tenor Nicholas Mulroy with Jeremy Denk, and Roderick Williams’s recitals in homage to Winterreise in English Song and Benjamin Britten – to chamber programmes that trace composers’ lives and ideas including JS Bach, Schubert, Brahms and Dowland across multiple concerts. The Festival is structured to invite audiences to stay and to listen more closely.

Rising stars

This year sees the festival debut of Javier Perianes, whose Chopin recital and subsequent appearance directing the Scottish Chamber Orchestra place him centre stage over a concentrated weekend.

The extraordinary viola player Timothy Ridout – one of the fastest-rising musicians of his generation – returns following a standout appearance in 2025, while younger artists including Scottish-Indian guitarist Samrat Majumder and the Fibonacci Quartet signal the festival’s ongoing commitment to discovery.

Choral

As ever Lammermuir Festival is a place where song and the human voice are celebrated.

A major focal point is the LammermuirFestival and Scottish Opera’s tribute to Benjamin Britten, marking the 50th anniversary of the composer’s death with a concert bringing together Les Illuminations, Phaedra and Our Hunting Fathers.

The choral programme includes Tenebrae, The Marian Consort, and The Binchois Consort performing music that spans five centuries, from Renaissance polyphony to contemporary works. The female voices of National Youth Choir of Scotland’s superb Chamber Choir join Scottish Ensemble in a programme which includes David Fennessy’s Blood, based on a vocal melody by 12th century composer Hildegard of Bingen.

There are also more intimate vocal concerts including Lucy Crowe singing Strauss’s Four Last Songs, Ailish Tynan joining Hebrides Ensemble for a Ravel-inspired Judith Weir song cycle written specifically for her, Matthew Brook joining Dunedin Consort for two beautiful solo cantatas by Buxtehude and Bach, and Joshua Ellicott joining Jeremy Denk for Janáček’s The Diary of One who Disappeared.

100 Tubas

While the great classical repertoire is at the festival’s core, Lammermuir has always embraced the unusual.

Red Note Ensemble, known for their fusion and experimental sounds, will be bringing an intriguing performance by one hundred tubas to Haddington’s Amisfield Walled Garden.

The 90-minute, sunset performance of Anthony Braxton’s Composition No 19, interspersed with heraldic brass fanfares, takes place on 19th September.

This year includes Kurtág’s Kafka Fragments, an intense work for soprano and violin performed by Claire Booth and Tamsin Waley-Cohen, and cross-genre explorations such as the Lodestar Trio, where folk traditions meet Baroque forms.

"Listen deeply"

James Waters, joint-Artistic Director of Lammermuir Festival says, “The ambition each year is simple: to match the beauty of the surroundings with music of equal depth and imagination.  We have developed close relationships with a number of major artists and this year we offer unique musical partnerships which create projects exclusive to our programme. Lammermuir Festival is a place where audiences are invited to slow down, listen deeply and experience incredibly special music in ways which feel both grounded and alive.”

Alan Morrison, Head of Music at Creative Scotland commented: “From early masterpieces to thrilling premieres, from intimate recitals to the rousing spectacle of a massed brass ensemble, the Lammermuir Festival brings the full depth and breadth of classical music to East Lothian. Supported by The National Lottery through Creative Scotland, this year’s programme offers a treasure trove of glittering highlights across a map of atmospheric locations.”

Friends of Lammermuir Festival booking is open now and general booking opens Friday 29 May. See Lammermuir Festival for box office.