Edinburgh International Festival 'back to full strength' with opening concert to honour Benedetti's husband
Newly-announced programme highlights for the EIF include a focus on America to mark 250 years since the Declaration of Independence.
The internationally acclaimed Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra is to take up a residency at the Edinburgh International Festival for the first time to mark the departure of director Nicola Benedetti’s husband from his role as artistic director there after 40 years.
The residency by the orchestra, which Wynton Marsalis founded in 1987, was announced as part of the full line-up for this year’s EIF, which Ms Benedetti said had “returned to full strength” after a pared-back version last year due to funding uncertainties.
The collaboration launches with Mr Marsalis’s symphony, All Rise, an opening concert with over 200 performers appearing onstage, with the concept of “All Rise” inspiring this year’s Festival theme.
Other newly-announced programme highlights for the EIF include a focus on America, to mark 250 years since the Declaration of Independence, as well as the world premiere of Missy Mazzoli and Royce Vavrek’s opera The Galloping Cure, about the global opioid crisis and performed by Scottish Opera.
Meanwhile, a concert will be held dedicated to the memory of John Wallace, a trumpeter and former principal of what is now the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
Mr Wallace, who was 76, played with orchestras including the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra and the Philharmonia Orchestra and performed a widely televised trumpet solo alongside opera singer Dame Kiri Te Kanawa at the wedding of King Charles to Lady Diana Spencer in 1981.
Ms Benedetti said this year’s festival would include performances in two extra venues: the newly refurbished King’s Theatre, which will host two productions offering reflections on America: Internationaal Theater Amsterdam’s epic five-hour staging of Tony Kushner’s Angels in America, the epoch-defining work of the AIDS crisis, and Geoff Sobelle’s Clown Show, a darkly satirical portrait of the modern American Dream. It will also host a series of talks, The Global Ideas Stage, curated by Ms Benedetti and Harvard Professor Sarah Lewis. Meanwhile, the EIF will also utilise the Festival Theatre’s Studio as an additional space.
‘Return to full scale’
Announcing the programme, she said: “It’s important to note that this festival is already a celebratory moment for us in our return back to a full-scale festival and our achievements in obtaining multi-year funding, allowing us to have that longer term vision.
“In particular, the excitement and anticipation of the re-opening of the King’s Theatre within the season will be a really emotional moment for all of us.”
Wynton Marsalis and violinist Ms Benedetti, who are married and have a young child together, revealed their relationship last year.
Ms Benedetti said: “He’s been leading the Jazz at Lincoln Centre Orchestra for 40 years and he founded the organisation, so it will be a seismic shift for them. I think 40 years is a good stint, a rare number to achieve with any one organisation. It’s an absolute privilege for us to finally be having the orchestra at the festival and particularly poignant in this closing hour of his time with them.”
She said the festival will also capitalise further on opening its headquarters at The Hub to the public, delving into the EIF archive for potential exhibitions within the building.
Ms Benedetti said the festival wanted to maximise “every possible stream of income” from statutory funding to income and philanthropy and aimed to become “one of the most affordable” arts festivals in the world.
“We’re always looking at ways to strengthen the mission of what we’re doing, to increase every single possible funding stream. One of our key aims as a festival is to ensure its financial resilience. In order for us to secure the world’s greatest artists, meanwhile make tickets available at an affordable price and do meaningful work with the community and young people, all these things require resilience financially.”
Ms Benedetti reiterated that a major closing event with fireworks, such as was last seen in 2022, would not return.
She said recent events in Iran had not affected the programming of the America strand, describing the US as a nation where “ideals of freedom sit alongside deep hypocrisy”.
“We are all drawn to its extreme possibilities because they reflect the aspirations and shortcomings we recognise in ourselves,” she said. “The American story is filled with innovation and ingenuity, perseverance and prejudice – tensions that have fuelled some of the most extraordinary artistic achievements in history.
Complex story of America
“Obviously, for all of us internally, we’ve been avidly watching the fast-paced, hour to hour changes led by the US. But our programme must and will stand the test of time. We’re really leaning on both artistic visionaries but also civic leaders who’ve told a complex story of America that relates to all of our lives and that does not alter or falter with the current situation.”
Late last year, the EIF announced early ticket sales for four of its performances in 2026. It said it would collaborate with Holland Festival and Festival d’Avignon for the first time since their founding 79 years ago on new theatre commission The Trial – after an Enemy of the People by Brazilian director Christiane Jatahy.
The pre-sale announcement also included the return after almost two decades of the Berliner Philharmoniker, with chief conductor Kirill Petrenko leading two concerts to the festival’s closing weekend, as well as San Francisco Ballet bringing the European premiere of Mere Mortals to the festival and the UK production premiere of Verdi’s A Masked Ball, a lavish, large-scale production in the Festival Theatre with the Orchestra of the Zurich Opera House.
Dana MacLeod, executive director of arts, communities and inclusion at Creative Scotland, said: “Edinburgh International Festival offers an experience to see work of significant scale and ambition, a driving force behind the magnetic energy of the August festivals. This truly international programme of world-class artists alongside homegrown talent creates a powerful channel for international ideas and positions the value of global connection at its core.”
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