Every year, Edinburgh International Festival (4-27 August) presents an unparalleled programme of world-class theatre, dance, opera and music performed in venues around the city. In Nicola Benedetti’s first year as Festival Director, the Festival asks the question: where do we go from here? Here is a snapshot of what this year has to offer.
23-25 August
Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater dazzles with technical brilliance and passionate energy, bringing audiences to their feet at every performance. They present two programmes of performances at this year’s Festival: beloved classics choreographed by their game-changing founder as well as a programme of contemporary choreography.
5 August
“She falls in love. She eats the guy. She dies.” The UK premiere of Ogresse, a new musical journey of myth and song created by Grammy® Award-winner Cécile McLorin Salvant. Catch Cécile in Concert on 7 August.
3-27 August
FOOD is an intimate dinner party of smell, taste and touch. Absurdist theatre maker Geoff Sobelle presents an immersive performance offering a meditation on how and why we eat.
3-27 August
At 314 floors high and with 78 spiral side departments, The Lost Lending Library houses the largest collection of books and stories in the world. In this immersive production for children from Punchdrunk Enrichment, the guardians of the Lost Lending Library are in urgent need of stories to fill a mysterious new department…
17-19 August
Specially assembled 34 dancers from across 14 African countries perform Pina Bausch’s acclaimed choreography of The Rite of Spring in a double bill with the duet common ground[s] by Germaine Acogny and Malou Airaudo.
9-11 August
Greek tragedy and pansori, an ancient Korean form of musical storytelling, blend in this production of Trojan Women from the National Changgeuk Company of Korea and directed by Ong Keng Sen and with music by Jung Jae-il (Squid Games, Parasite, Okja).
15 August
Composer, cellist and singer Ayanna Witter-Johnson joins forces with the LSO Percussion Ensemble for a jazz-infused performance.
8 August
In typical Budapest Festival Orchestra fashion, this is a concert with a difference! Immerse yourself in Dvořák’s lively Eighth Symphony in this evening of music and conversation, presented in the round – with audiences sitting on beanbags.
27 August
Anoushka Shankar is a masterful sitar player and the first Indian woman to be nominated for a Grammy Award®. She now returns to the International Festival with a new quintet of musicians to perform music from her recent mini-album alongside reinterpreted gems from her previous releases.
26 August
Charistmatic Venezuelan conductor Gustavo Dudamel, Music Director of the sensational Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela, conducts a concert that celebrates the musicians’ homeland and Mahler’s spectacular First Symphony.